At 20:08 14/08/2005, Lukas Smith wrote:
Zeev Suraski wrote:
Even if we forget about the users, and only think about ourselves -
unless something drastic happens, we're going to look at supporting 4
major different versions simultaneously - 4.3/4.4, 5.0, 5.1 and 6.0. Is
it really such a great idea to start breaking compatibility beyond what
we absolutely have to?
I agree that breaking BC is not a binary thing. I also agree that not
being academically pure has not prevent PHP from succeeding on quite a
large scale. However I think stuff like renaming functions and dropping
aliases can be easily countered by a BC lib like PEAR::PHP_Compat
(http://pear.php.net/package/PHP_Compat/). There is even a package in PEAR
that will determine the necessary includes you will need to make based on
your code and your PHP version (http://pear.php.net/package/PHP_CompatInfo/).
Lukas,
That's an excellent response. If one percent of the energy put into the
'yay parade' and the 'let's break this too!' parade were invested in coming
up with a clean upgrade path, I wouldn't have had to write the response I
wrote.
That was not the tone of the letter initially sent. Quoting the header of
the original letter (which was approved by way too many people):
"It would mean many apps would need some work to work on PHP 6, but at the
same time I think it is work people would welcome since it would mostly
involve removing hacks instead of adding them."
If we are to continue with that idea, we need to strike that one out
completely. Instead, we need to come up with clear instructions on how to
upgrade without forcing people to audit their applications. Your letter is
a good first step. It's very much contradictory to the original letter (it
is in fact adding more hacks to work around the removed features), but if
we are to remove these features, that's the way to go.
The way I see it, for every feature that we intend to discontinue, there
needs to be a turnkey solution to work around, with a guide on how to do
that, and a mention of the consequences if any.
The way I see it #2, I still see next to no motivation to make some of the
moves, since they buy us nothing other than academic purity.
Zeev
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