Re: GNOME 2.0 conversation

[George <jirka 5z com>]

On Sat, Feb 17, 2001 at 10:47:31PM -0500, Havoc Pennington wrote:
> Answer is case-by-case. For the stock system, probably possible. For
> GtkPixmapMenuItem also. For GnomeDialog, not possible. This is the
> kind of cleanup work I think we can get done in time though.  What I
> don't want to see personally would be new features and widgets. If it
> merits a new header file, probably a bad idea, IMHO.

Basically agreed.  I think the headerfile rule is a bit silly.  But point
taken.

> GTK 2 has some source incompatibility, but mostly for widget
> implementors, it's really not very bad for application code (gftp
> compiled unchanged a while ago, Dia ported in 1/2 hour). For widget
> implementors even it's not really difficult to port, just some trivial
> code rearrangment. So we shouldn't use GTK 2 as an excuse to go
> nuts. That said, sure some breakage is OK.

Well gtk already went through one incompat release, and this is the first for
g-l.

> Random rules we should follow:
> 
>  - If it the breakage results in old code that still compiles but no 
>    longer works, it's very Evil. Breakage should break compilation so 
>    it can get fixed.
> 
>  - Don't break stuff that's deprecated anyhow. Why port to the new
>    version of a feature you shouldn't be using?
> 
>  - GTK has docs/Changes-2.0.txt plus a more verbose document I'm
>    writing, need a gnome-libs equivalent.

All of these are basically followed in gnome-libs HEAD.  I tried to keep most
changes I did in devel-docs/Porting-1.0-2.0.txt, though that's not complete.

Functions that have changed names have the old one still there, and it prints
a warning.

> When I say gnome-libs work is in conflict with user features, what I
> mean by "gnome-libs work" is new features and finishing those. There's
> time for cleanup by July or so, but not much else.

I would definately agree that major new features are just not going to happen
before July.  Thus won't go in.

> > Well, I think most changes should aim for the gnome 2 release, but there
> > should be a backup plan if we can't deliver. 
> 
> What's the backup plan? If you have a half-finished gnome-libs, then
> what are you going to release in its place?

No.  Again, not a 1/0 thing.  If you have a half finished feature, it doesn't
go into the released version.  A backup plan may be to either put it into
some sort of extra lib, or cut and paste it into apps that need it.

But again, I doubt getting a brand spanking new widget in is too feasible.  I
would however make ane xception for a file selector dialog widget which uses
gnome-vfs and all this, since we NEED a widget like that.

George

-- 
George <jirka 5z com>
   The great masses of the people ... will more easily
   fall victims to a big lie than to a small one.
                       -- Adolf Hitler, "Mein Kampf", 1933