Re: People still using v1.3 - finding out why
Graham Leggett wrote: Hi all, I've been keen to do some digging for reasons why someone might need to install httpd v1.3 instead of v2.0 or later. Support for mod_backhand seems to be a significant reason (and getting backhand ported to v2.0 would be a win): Apart from backhand, are there in the experience of the people on this list any other significant apps out there that are keeping people from deploying httpd v2.x? Regards, Graham -- Hi, in my organization we are heavy users of Apache 1.3 and have no intent of migrating to 2 yet. The main reason why we are not migrating to 2 is related to bug 17877 I filed for Apache 1.3 last year. We are using Apache as a reverse proxy using mod_rewrite and mod_proxy and we need to proxy WebDAV requests. Those requests are often sent using Chunked as their transfer-encoding, and our reverse proxies need to forward those. The vanilla mod_proxy rejects those requests (in both 1.3 and 2.0), but as we cannot control the DAV clients being used this kind of behaviour is not an option we can tolerate. I patched mod_proxy in 1.3 to pass those requests 'AS IS' to the origin servers (which we KNOW for sure to be 1.1 compliant). My patch would not port easily to version 2 as the structure of mod_proxy has changed significantly between 1.3 and 2. The availability of filtering in Apache 2 seemed at first a nice feature to use but it turned out keepalive connections' requests are far from easy to handle, at least using mod_perl and the perl filter hooks. I do not know if this has been fixed yet or not as I did not have time to look again at mod_perl but this was sure a problem for us to start using this nice Apache 2 feature. Mathias. 'AS IS' to the origin servers otherwise they might just crash due to the size of the data being transfered (several hundreds of Mb or even several Gb) which canno
Re: People still using v1.3 - finding out why
On Mon, 22 Nov 2004, Mathias Herberts wrote: The main reason why we are not migrating to 2 is related to bug 17877 I filed for Apache 1.3 last year. Erm, you file a bug report for Apache 1 and treat it as a reason not to upgrade to apache 2? Should I Cc: this to Scott Adams? If you'd filed a bug for Apache 2, maybe it would have been fixed by now. Like, for example, when I had a mini-blitz on mod_proxy bugs ( http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=apache-cvsm=108862194618599w=2 ) Or anyone else who has worked on mod_proxy in the time since your report. -- Nick Kew
Re: People still using v1.3 - finding out why
Nick Kew wrote: On Mon, 22 Nov 2004, Mathias Herberts wrote: The main reason why we are not migrating to 2 is related to bug 17877 I filed for Apache 1.3 last year. Erm, you file a bug report for Apache 1 and treat it as a reason not to upgrade to apache 2? Should I Cc: this to Scott Adams? Well, put Scott in Cc if you want :-). I was using Apache 1 at the time I filed the bug and was not in the process of migrating. I fixed the bug and had our setup work without problem. The bug as I filed it is still open as the HTTP compliance of forwarding Chunked requests to origin servers still does not seem to be clear. If you'd filed a bug for Apache 2, maybe it would have been fixed by now. I started a thread back in june: http://www.gossamer-threads.com/lists/apache/dev/264479 but I think the HTTP compliance problem is still of some concern and is in the way of a solution being found. Mathias.
Re: People still using v1.3 - finding out why
On Mon, 22 Nov 2004, Mathias Herberts wrote: Nick Kew wrote: On Mon, 22 Nov 2004, Mathias Herberts wrote: The main reason why we are not migrating to 2 is related to bug 17877 I filed for Apache 1.3 last year. Erm, you file a bug report for Apache 1 and treat it as a reason not to upgrade to apache 2? Should I Cc: this to Scott Adams? Well, put Scott in Cc if you want :-). I was using Apache 1 at the time I filed the bug and was not in the process of migrating. I fixed the bug and had our setup work without problem. The bug as I filed it is still open as the HTTP compliance of forwarding Chunked requests to origin servers still does not seem to be clear. Well, mod_proxy in Apache 1.x doesn't claim to be HTTP/1.1, so there's no reason it should be expected to support chunked encoding. And since Apache 1.x is a maintenance-only product not in active development, that's not too likely to change - ever. If you'd filed a bug for Apache 2, maybe it would have been fixed by now. I started a thread back in june: http://www.gossamer-threads.com/lists/apache/dev/264479 Aha, I have no recollection of that. The thing about list posts is they're easy to overlook if the subject is not one of great concern at the time. And on June 3rd I was doing some urgent work as well as rehearsing an opera production that was on stage the following week. Bugzilla is different - it's a database. I will of course search for relevant bugs any time I'm contemplating any substantial update to a module. -- Nick Kew
Re: People still using v1.3 - finding out why
Nick Kew wrote: Well, mod_proxy in Apache 1.x doesn't claim to be HTTP/1.1, so there's no reason it should be expected to support chunked encoding. And since Apache 1.x is a maintenance-only product not in active development, that's not too likely to change - ever. The mod_proxy in v1.3 does claim to be an HTTP/1.1 proxy, but it doesn't claim to be a fully compliant one. There were some protocol things that were too hard to do in v1.3, and so were only fixed in v2.0. Active development is currently being done on v2.1 (soon to be v2.2) with active backports to v2.0. Currently v1.3 is maintenance only, which basically means security fixes are all you will get at the moment. Regards, Graham --
Re: People still using v1.3 - finding out why
Hi, another reason may be mod_perl, althought mod_perl 2.0 is available for quite some time, and there is a good documentation how to migrate applications, many applications based on mod_perl haven't done so. The problem is not the same as for mod_php. mod_php 4.* has been available for apache 1.3 and apache 2 but mod_perl 1 only for apache 1 and mod_perl 2 only for apache 2. Mason(a mod_perl app) for eg. has mod_perl 2 support since 2004-10-18: -snip- As of Mason 1.27 (released 10/28/2004), there is support for Apache/mod_perl 2.0 in the core Mason code -snap- I have been using 2.0 since 2.0.35 but have damned our decision when serious breakage occured in mod_ssl in combination with various browsers and 3rd party ssl clients between version 2.0.46 and 2.0.49. 1.3, since I use it, never had those problems. Don't take me wrong, I like 2.0 and love it's features and the stability now is far better than when it was introduced, but I can understand people that call it too risky to migrate to 2.0. regards klaus
Re: People still using v1.3 - finding out why
On Thu, 18 Nov 2004 13:43:17 -0600, Graham Leggett [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Apart from backhand, are there in the experience of the people on this list any other significant apps out there that are keeping people from deploying httpd v2.x? The only complaint about functional regression I've heard from our user base in quite a while is disk caching proxy. (needs stable mod_disk_cache, where stable means something more than we just addressed a bunch of known issues, please go put it in production and let us know how many times your pager goes off ;) ) For the users I work with, it is rare that they depend on a third-party module which doesn't already support 2.0, and in fact there are a number of common situations where 2.0 is a better solution: If you were using server; 2.0, this issue wouldn't occur. (e.g., various resources both in core server and in key modules which are utilized much more efficiently with threaded server) If you were using server; 2.0, we could work around this problem as follows (e.g., implement small module utilizing 2.0 API features to work-around limitation of some other part of the system) With server; 2.0, feature A and feature B are not mutually exclusive. But it takes multiple occurrences of these situations over time before user will switch since the user needs to spend bulk of their time worrying about their applications instead of messing with the web server. So users with less interesting environments (problem situations are rare) remain on 1.3 much longer, while users with more interesting environments are predominantly on 2.0.
RE: People still using v1.3 - finding out why
We continue to have 1.3 servers because the Enhydra Director module, needed for Enydra Application Server version 3, has not been ported to Apache 2. The reason is that the Enhydra folks have long since abandoned the protocol and now use AJP13, for which there is already mod_jk2 and the AJP13 proxy in 2.1. The obvious solution is to either upgrade Enhydra to a newer version or move to another app server. We decided to move to another app server, but it's a lengthy process when you have 100's of applications written for the old app server. To combat the problem, I wrote a patch for Apache 2 to do session cookie based load balancing in combination with rewrite rules (which I submitted long ago to this group- but I think it becomes moot in Apache 2.2) and have written scripts which convert our enhydra director config files over to a set of proxy rewrite rules- so we are attempting to use the HTTP connector of the enhydra app server. This has a set of its own problems- like applications which depend on API's to return the remote host IP or bugs in the HTTP connector implementation (ie, lack of URL decoding...) So enhydra director is the reason we've not been able to dump Apache 1.3; but we have plans to work around our issues and gradually continue to move to Apache 2. Byron -Original Message- From: Graham Leggett [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, November 18, 2004 2:43 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: People still using v1.3 - finding out why Hi all, I've been keen to do some digging for reasons why someone might need to install httpd v1.3 instead of v2.0 or later. Support for mod_backhand seems to be a significant reason (and getting backhand ported to v2.0 would be a win): Apart from backhand, are there in the experience of the people on this list any other significant apps out there that are keeping people from deploying httpd v2.x? Regards, Graham --
Re: People still using v1.3 - finding out why
I don't work in the same group anymore, so I am not sure where we are with the 2. versions. I do know that we have large number of custom hacks in there, including one I did many moons ago for supporting hundreds of thousands of name based virtual hosts without having to enter them in the config file. That hack depended on the prefork model, and I haven't looked into porting it yet. Peter
Re: People still using v1.3 - finding out why
On Fri, 19 Nov 2004, Peter Friend wrote: I don't work in the same group anymore, so I am not sure where we are with the 2. versions. I do know that we have large number of custom hacks in there, including one I did many moons ago for supporting hundreds of thousands of name based virtual hosts without having to enter them in the config file. That hack depended on the prefork model, and I haven't looked into porting it yet. And this is different from mod_vhost_alias in what way? --Cliff
People still using v1.3 - finding out why
Hi all, I've been keen to do some digging for reasons why someone might need to install httpd v1.3 instead of v2.0 or later. Support for mod_backhand seems to be a significant reason (and getting backhand ported to v2.0 would be a win): Apart from backhand, are there in the experience of the people on this list any other significant apps out there that are keeping people from deploying httpd v2.x? Regards, Graham --
Re: People still using v1.3 - finding out why
On Nov 18, 2004, at 11:43 AM, Graham Leggett wrote: Hi all, I've been keen to do some digging for reasons why someone might need to install httpd v1.3 instead of v2.0 or later. Support for mod_backhand seems to be a significant reason (and getting backhand ported to v2.0 would be a win): Apart from backhand, are there in the experience of the people on this list any other significant apps out there that are keeping people from deploying httpd v2.x? I think there is still a thought that php isn't mature on 2.x. (I'm using it) But some people, notably the php folks last I saw. Suggested 1.3 as the stable production server to use instead of 2.x -- Nathanael D. Noblet Gnat Solutions 204 - 131 Gorge Road E Victoria, BC V9A 1L1 T/F 250.385.4613 http://www.gnat.ca/
Re: People still using v1.3 - finding out why
On Thu, 2004-11-18 at 13:43 -0600, Graham Leggett wrote: Hi all, I've been keen to do some digging for reasons why someone might need to install httpd v1.3 instead of v2.0 or later. Support for mod_backhand seems to be a significant reason (and getting backhand ported to v2.0 would be a win): Apart from backhand, are there in the experience of the people on this list any other significant apps out there that are keeping people from deploying httpd v2.x? Regards, Graham that's easy... as long as it will be the default in debian stable... people won't bother with 2.0
Re: People still using v1.3 - finding out why
Nathanael Noblet wrote: On Nov 18, 2004, at 11:43 AM, Graham Leggett wrote: Hi all, I've been keen to do some digging for reasons why someone might need to install httpd v1.3 instead of v2.0 or later. Support for mod_backhand seems to be a significant reason (and getting backhand ported to v2.0 would be a win): Apart from backhand, are there in the experience of the people on this list any other significant apps out there that are keeping people from deploying httpd v2.x? I think there is still a thought that php isn't mature on 2.x. (I'm using it) But some people, notably the php folks last I saw. Suggested 1.3 as the stable production server to use instead of 2.x Yes, that's a big reason in my experience. People tried using PHP with a multithreaded Apache long time ago, got burned, and are now afraid to try it again. I think it's mostly a matter of marketing now. I think it would be a good idea to go with a stable 2.2, and make a strong marketing push to get people to adopt it. -- ModSecurity (http://www.modsecurity.org) [ Open source IDS for Web applications ]
Re: People still using v1.3 - finding out why
Interesting question. I have just done a large scale review of our web server architecture and have recommended a move to 2.0. There were a number of factors for not moving, both specific to our installation as well as in general. In general : Remeber the old adage If it is not broke, do not fix it. The 1.3 series is still an amazing piece of software. Specifically, the arguements against moving in our case : mod_auth_oracle has not been ported to 2.0. One module I wrote would have to be redone for 2.0. This module gave us a 60% performance boost on our request latency time and has to be in any installation. I made changes to the 1.3 proxy code which I do not look forward to changing in 2.0. Due to our hardware architecture (IBM BladeCenter and Linux) scalability was not an issue. What won me over? Load balancing and fail over proposals in mod_proxy for the 2.2 series. As I am moving to a new hardware platform in December, I felt it best to bite the bullet to 2.0 now. Performance wise I noticed little difference between the two using prefork MPM. With the bladecenter there was no requirement for scalability. Thats about it. BTW if it makes a difference,this Apache installation is nothing more than a central HTTP hub for proxying to mutliple back end servers. Jeffrey Burgoyne Chief Technology Architect KCSI Keenuh Consulting Services Inc [EMAIL PROTECTED] Hi all, I've been keen to do some digging for reasons why someone might need to install httpd v1.3 instead of v2.0 or later. Support for mod_backhand seems to be a significant reason (and getting backhand ported to v2.0 would be a win): Apart from backhand, are there in the experience of the people on this list any other significant apps out there that are keeping people from deploying httpd v2.x? Regards, Graham
Re: People still using v1.3 - finding out why
A can think of 4 big reasons, two from a developer standpoint and two from an admin. developer: 1. Builds and compiles in a minute, rather than several. This means you can play around and develop more and compile less. 2. More streamlined design; for some filters, bb's and the dependency may be stumbling blocks. admin: 1. They are used to it. 2. Smaller footprint. At least, this is the feedback I get from people. -- === Jim Jagielski [|] [EMAIL PROTECTED] [|] http://www.jaguNET.com/ There 10 types of people: those who read binary and everyone else.
Re: People still using v1.3 - finding out why
Jim Jagielski wrote: A can think of 4 big reasons, two from a developer standpoint and two from an admin. developer: 1. Builds and compiles in a minute, rather than several. This means you can play around and develop more and compile less. 2. More streamlined design; for some filters, bb's and the dependency may be stumbling blocks. And: 3. While the 1.3 API is well documented, the documentation for 2.0 is sparse. I have always thought a good book on APR programming, possibly with a chapter or two on Apache, would do wonders for the popularity of Apache 2. -- ModSecurity (http://www.modsecurity.org) [ Open source IDS for Web applications ]
Re: People still using v1.3 - finding out why
On Nov 18, 2004, at 12:16 PM, Ivan Ristic wrote: Jim Jagielski wrote: A can think of 4 big reasons, two from a developer standpoint and two from an admin. developer: 1. Builds and compiles in a minute, rather than several. This means you can play around and develop more and compile less. 2. More streamlined design; for some filters, bb's and the dependency may be stumbling blocks. And: 3. While the 1.3 API is well documented, the documentation for 2.0 is sparse. I would have to agree with the above. I started trying to learn the module programming for 2.0. Most of what is out there assumes you are doing one or two things, and didn't include enough to get it all pieced together. I have to admit that I figured it all out from the pieces, but took me close to a week of comparing different modules and what they did to get my module to do integrate with apache, never mind actually work on its own. I have always thought a good book on APR programming, possibly with a chapter or two on Apache, would do wonders for the popularity of Apache 2. I agree. Though by far don't have the knowledge to do it myself. -- Nathanael D. Noblet Gnat Solutions 204 - 131 Gorge Road E Victoria, BC V9A 1L1 T/F 250.385.4613 http://www.gnat.ca/
Re: People still using v1.3 - finding out why
I think people rely on apache 1.3 stability and security. many people consider httpd-2.0 as too young and don't try to understand why it's better. Does somebody have some percentage about 1.3 use and 2.0 ? I don't think 1.3 is still here because of modules, there is too many modules and too many kind to use apache (perl, php, proxy, cache + deflate, etc...) Is php not stable with 2.0 prefork ??? But what i don't understand, is how people can say apache 1.3 is better to code with, than apache 2.0. filters are so usefull. it's a pleasure everyday to code with apache 2.0 :] This discussion remind me some before, with this eternal subject (1.3 or 2.0) I think it's a question of time, and a question of fashion... What i can say is when i go see customers, there are more who tell me they are now using 2.0 than saying still using 1.3... In case people are searching good book on httpd-2.0 programming, ryan b bloom one is perfect and really usefull to understand why it's better than 1.3. regards, Matthieu
RE: People still using v1.3 - finding out why
Please don't forget: 1. Solaris 10 is shipping with 1.3.31 2. OpenBSD's fork of 1.3 --Brett. Systems Administrator, RHCE -Original Message- From: Graham Leggett [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, November 18, 2004 11:43 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: People still using v1.3 - finding out why Hi all, I've been keen to do some digging for reasons why someone might need to install httpd v1.3 instead of v2.0 or later. Support for mod_backhand seems to be a significant reason (and getting backhand ported to v2.0 would be a win): Apart from backhand, are there in the experience of the people on this list any other significant apps out there that are keeping people from deploying httpd v2.x? Regards, Graham --
Re: People still using v1.3 - finding out why
Brett Lentz (Excell Data Corporation) wrote: Please don't forget: 1. Solaris 10 is shipping with 1.3.31 Redhat is shipping 2.0 for long time now 2. OpenBSD's fork of 1.3 openbsd and the theocracy ?? hahaha cool let them continue with 1.3 --Brett. Systems Administrator, RHCE -Original Message- From: Graham Leggett [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, November 18, 2004 11:43 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: People still using v1.3 - finding out why Hi all, I've been keen to do some digging for reasons why someone might need to install httpd v1.3 instead of v2.0 or later. Support for mod_backhand seems to be a significant reason (and getting backhand ported to v2.0 would be a win): Apart from backhand, are there in the experience of the people on this list any other significant apps out there that are keeping people from deploying httpd v2.x? Regards, Graham --
Re: People still using v1.3 - finding out why
Matthieu Estrade wrote: I think people rely on apache 1.3 stability and security. many people consider httpd-2.0 as too young and don't try to understand why it's better. Does somebody have some percentage about 1.3 use and 2.0 ? I don't think 1.3 is still here because of modules, there is too many modules and too many kind to use apache (perl, php, proxy, cache + deflate, etc...) Is php not stable with 2.0 prefork ??? It is stable. I'm sure you can get it to segfault if you tried, but the same goes with 1.3. But what i don't understand, is how people can say apache 1.3 is better to code with, than apache 2.0. filters are so usefull. it's a pleasure everyday to code with apache 2.0 :] I never thought it was a matter of coding, It's more a matter of porting. From the conversations I hear/see it is the module developer who runs 1.3 and is quite happy with it for their needs. The other factor I see in the 'auth' category of modules is that the API has changed radically in 2.1, and so some people have just skipped 2.0 for their modules. --Ian I'm waiting for the people still using v2.0 when 2.2 goes stable. regards, Matthieu
Re: People still using v1.3 - finding out why
At 01:53 PM 11/18/2004, Nathanael Noblet wrote: On Nov 18, 2004, at 11:43 AM, Graham Leggett wrote: I've been keen to do some digging for reasons why someone might need to install httpd v1.3 instead of v2.0 or later. I think there is still a thought that php isn't mature on 2.x. (I'm using it) But some people, notably the php folks last I saw. Suggested 1.3 as the stable production server to use instead of 2.x Let's not lose sight of the root of this problem. In order to properly write php4apache2filter - we needed PHP's engine to allow us to push the script, IIRC... at that time Zend only offered us pull-based file handling. Instead of a real solution, this 'filter' simply assumed there was a file bucket, sucked the fd and passed that to zend. It was no filter, and it often did not work at all when the content had been parsed. Sooo... php4apache2handler was born, which solved this whole hassle by being a handler-only module. And then PHP5 was born, and now has the hooks we needed in the first place to create a PHP filter module. Fun weekend warrior project if someone wants to spend the cycles in the php5 tree. Understand that the handler works -just-fine- and with prefork there was never an issue with thread-unsafe libraries. But the project's docs continue to promulgate the FUD. Last I looked the regression rate (folks adopting 2.0 and then reverting to 1.3) is quite low, within the margin of error for most mixed-server load balanced servers: http://www.securityspace.com/s_survey/data/man.200410/srvch.html?server=Apacherevision=Apache%2F2.0.51 (substitute whichever sub-version 1.3 or 2.0 you like.) Also notice a much higher percentage adopt the latest and greatest 2.0.x release when announced than those who adopt the latest and greatest 1.3.x release. So as others noted, a large percentage of this imbalance is probably explained by bundled distros. The overall adoption is actually reasonably impressive; 4.51% are using IIS 6, roughly 9.66% (forgive rounding errors) are using a fairly stock 2.0 (not renamed), while 13.5% don't admit their version of Apache at all. Dollars to donuts, those 2.0 users are very actively aware of their installed servers and more likely to disable the version tag than those using an stock, OS distribution flavor of version 1.3. And for fun... http://www.securityspace.com/s_survey/data/man.200410/srvch.html?server=Apacherevision=Apache indicates about 3/4% of our users per month are dropping their version from our server string. It makes an interesting graph; http://www.securityspace.com/s_survey/server_graph.html?type=httpdomaindir=month=200410serv1=QXBhY2hl Bill
Re: People still using v1.3 - finding out why
From: Graham Leggett are there in the experience of the people on this list any other significant apps out there that are keeping people from deploying httpd v2.x? Because there can only be one number one! ASF told them over and over again that it is number one. (rightly or not) The users followed ASF words Because there can only be one number one! The users believe, if it wasn't number one, ASF would have pulled it. Because there can only be one number one! ASF has not! Because there can only be one number one! Good luck, Jeff
Re: People still using v1.3 - finding out why
Personally, I have seen some hosting providers which I have talked to (and worked with) hold back because existing client's htaccess scripts sometimes experience quirks under 2.0. In one case I have been privvy to, a test implementation was done with a server that was practically a replica of a running client hosting environment (as it was created from a backup), then upgraded the underlying apache from 1.3 to 2.0 with a configuration of modules as close to the old one as possible. In that case, several client sites with dynamic applications started throwing up errors due to configuration changes (and perhaps misconfigurations) in a combination of scripts and htaccess files. In one particular case, a files block was being used to force processing of anything called in a certain directory as a PHP script in order to provide a true path-info address for a dynamic script. (instead of blah/this.php/that/that its blah/this/that/that ). I am not sure if this is still the case or not... Also, I know that in some cases, adoption of Apache 2 was delayed by integration with tools that provide some level of automated administration. In most installations, this has already been solved but it certainly hindered the initial adoption rate. -- Wayne S. Frazee Any sufficiently developed bug is indistinguishable from a feature. On Thursday 18 November 2004 12:43, Graham Leggett wrote: Hi all, I've been keen to do some digging for reasons why someone might need to install httpd v1.3 instead of v2.0 or later. pgpWXkrMGnDJa.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: People still using v1.3 - finding out why
Graham Leggett , Thursday, November 18, 2004 14:43Hi all, I've been keen to do some digging for reasons why someone might need to install httpd v1.3 instead of v2.0 or later. I have no idea. Stupidity, laziness, fear of change. Maybe it's modules. The bandwidth throttling module might be a valid reason. Some people want to get a few more years of their money's worth that they paid for those $500+ third-party modules 5 years ago, like ASP and FrontPage or whatever. Smaller businesses (the customer) may have had very customized modules made for 1.3 and not have the cash or the incentive (low web revenues) to invest in a programmer to convert to 2.0. I used to work at an ISP as sysadmin three years ago, and everything was 1.3, though 2.0 was still reported as beta, but also reported as running the main Apache website. That's a mixed signal: either you're not confident to stop calling it beta, or you're confident to run your majorly, vitally important website with it. :p PHP is a fun language and I really enjoy using it, but I don't get the FUD crap. I've played with Apache 2.0 for over 2 years now (mostly prefork MPM) and I had only one PHP4 problem, and it was not Apache, but it was a PHP4 problem. After reading the bug database, I saw that they refused to acknonwledge it as a PHP4 problem in thepast and just blamed Apache by default when they heard mention of Apache 2, closed bugs, marked as invalid, refused to reopen or mark as duplicates, repeatedly fixed the problem (several months after it was reported), and repeatedly broke the problem again (same types of reports across multiple versions), and repeatedly announced fixes for the same exact problem. This all seems retarded, to have such animosity or unfriendliness to each other. The server is the one that the language most often runs on, and it is one of the most popular languages to ever run on the server. It would seem like a naturally symbiotic relationship with a huge incentive to cooperate. Eventually, just stop offering 1.3 for download, stop patching 1.3, remove the ability to file 1.3 bug reports, and I suppose people would upgrade, but it probably wouldn't make any friends. ;-) Leif
