Before playing around with api serious bugs should be fixed...  I see xxXx 
unresolved bugs on pahricator.   It is frustrating....

> Date: Thu, 18 Jun 2015 14:56:25 -0700
> From: [email protected]
> To: [email protected]
> Subject: Re: [Wikitech-l] API BREAKING CHANGE: Default continuation mode for 
> action=query will change at the end of this month
> 
> On Thu, Jun 18, 2015 at 9:26 AM, Brian Gerstle <[email protected]>
> wrote:
> 
> > I guess it comes down to is this: if we're going to continue supporting
> > old behavior, they should be accessible via the same old requests.  *This
> > removes the need for existing clients to be updated in the first place*.
> > If we eventually want to delete the old code keeping the old behavior
> > separated from the new will make it clear & explicit what's being dropped
> > and what to use instead. ...
> >
> > Lastly, changing the default behavior to make things sane for new
> > developers is, IMO, a bad trade-off
> 
> 
> That seems the crux of it. Because the MediaWiki API isn't versioned (and
> there are good reasons for it), the recommended "best practices" form of an
> API request evolves, something like
> 
> api.php?continue=& formatversion=2 &utf8= &*your_actual_params*
> 
> and over time the best practices boilerplate at the front gets longer
> unless we change a default and break old clients. Examples and
> documentation should show best practices; T103015 is to use formatversion=2
> and "https" in all example API requests. (We should have used &continue= in
> examples for the last year, it's too late now.)
> 
> The above is actually a real URL and shows three different approaches:
> 1. As the e-mail subject says we're going to make continue= the default in
> a few weeks so you won't need to add it (but clients MUST add rawcontinue=
> to get the old behavior).
> 2. formatversion=2 is the future but won't be the default for a while.
> 3. If you request formatversion=2 then results default to utf8, so you
> don't need to specify utf8.  (Note formatversion=2 only applies to
> format=json or php.)
> 
> Which approach to take is a judgement call, I'm interject-opinion-reluctant
> :)
> 
> 
> 
> > because they'll eventually get tripped by us pulling the rug out from
> > under their feet by *breaking backwards compatibility stable APIs*.
> 
> 
> Or, over time the best practices boilerplate endlessly expands:
> responselayout=clean &reporterrors=schema &facebookoverlordmode= ... Does
> that make our API "user-hostile"? IMO it just makes it wordy.
> 
> 
> 
> > Those sorts of changes should be reserved for experimental or even beta
> > APIs.  Continuing queries seems like a stable—and pervasive—part of the API.
> >
> 
> Cheers,
> -- 
> =S Page  WMF Tech writer
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