Now (finally) Qt 5.6.0 LTS knocks at the door (RC published today)
I appreciate the decisions to support this 5.6.x release for at least 3
years, plus possible time extension.
Looking for a definition what this actually means, I could find in
Planet Qt http://blog.qt.io/blog/2016/02/22/qt-roadmap-for-2016/ :
[quote]
Long-Term Support
Qt 5.6 is the first Long-Term Supported (LTS) version of Qt since Qt
4.8. As part of our LTS promise,
we guarantee that Qt 5.6 will be supported for three years via standard
support, after which additional
extended support can be purchased. During this time period, even though
following
Qt releases (Qt 5.7, Qt 5.8 and so on) are available, Qt 5.6 will
receive patch releases providing
bug fixes and security updates throughout the three-year period after
the release.
[quote]
This sounds good: support, bug fixes and security updates! Yeah!
In other mailing list threads
(http://lists.qt-project.org/pipermail/development/2016-February/024943.html)
there is even discussion if platforms that might establish in these 3
years should get support... wow!
But who decides or gives guidance to the developers, if a bug found in
5.6.x should be fixed in this LTS.
E.g. have a look at a patch history in
https://codereview.qt-project.org/#/c/109157/
That patch evolved through 5.4, 5.5, 5.6 and now is moved to 5.7 with
advice to use C++11 features.
The comments finally focused in a discussion on what branch/release to
put that particular bug fix / behavior change.
There is some arguing that this patch is a "behavior change", but which
fix is not a behavior change.
Sometimes bugs do not crash they "just" do not what the documentation
says: It's not always easy to tell.
So my question or suggestion to reduced bug fixing time is:
- Is there or should there be an authority/committee that decides early,
if a bug is worth to be fixed for 5.6 LTS?
Maybe in bugreports.qt.io: if the "Affects Version/s" contains
"5.6.x" the authority
could "Label" it 5.6-LTS to hint the fixing branch?
- Is there or should there be a Wiki-Page giving rules of thump, what
inconsistent between API docs and actual behavior
is a bug that should be fixed in 5.6 LTS?
I think this could help developers to decide early, if the patch should
evolve with old compiler compatibility and
becomes a fix in 5.6.x, or if the developer should jump directly to the
5.7 branch and make use of nice C++11 features.
Cheers,
Michael
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