Re: About GTK+ 3.0 and deprecated things

[Paul Davis <paul linuxaudiosystems com>]

On Thu, 2008-07-17 at 16:02 +0100, Xan wrote:

> This is exactly what they are doing, that's why they call it GTK+ 3.0,
> or 2.99.0, or whatever. You are free to keep using and maintaining the
> 2.x series for as long as you need. Now, if you'd like *others* to
> spend *their* time doing what *you* would like them to do, well,
> that's different.

i think the problem is midway between these two. Developers using GTK+
would like developers of GTK+ to do the new, good stuff that one or
other or both groups are fired up about. but they'd like it done in a
way that doesn't negatively affect them.

so the developers of GTK+ have said "we can't do that without dealing
the public/private issues in the current API", and so we have G_SEAL.
this provides a transitioning bridge from things-that-should-never-
have-been-public-but-were to the new world of only-public-things-are
actually-public. this is fair enough.

i think the problem is one of perception. its not obvious to most
developers using GTK+ how the public/private stuff really impacts work
on the things they'd like to see addressed in GTK+. to many of us, its
not clear why its necessary to move to 3.0 to get substantive stuff
done. its not that we know we're right, its that we just don't get the
justification.

a few more specific examples would probably help to clear the air of
this question. kris gave us one slightly hand-wavy one. can anybody
offer some more?

as far as deprecated stuff goes, i have to confess that i am in total
agreement with its (pre-announced) removal. 

--p