Re: First deprecate APIs and then remove them in the next major version



On Sun, Dec 17, 2017 at 1:12 AM, Christian Schoenebeck <schoenebeck linuxsampler org> wrote:
On Samstag, 16. Dezember 2017 12:05:03 CET Sébastien Wilmet wrote:
> On Fri, Dec 15, 2017 at 11:10:46AM -0500, Matthias Clasen wrote:
> > I know this may sound harsh, but: If you want things to work differently,
> > send patches.

In theory. In practice you send patches and then you get a response like "hmm,
not sure about that, I would like to have it differently", and that without an
actual suggestion how to do that "differently".

Like you said, if you want things differently, send your patches. But then as
a patch sender you have the same expectation: you don't like the patch, make a
better suggestion! You don't have a better suggestion or at least an adequate
feedback? Ok, then apply the patch and simply add FIXME comment(s) at your own
discretion and maybe one day somebody replaces it with a better solution.

Just one example, gtk3 (yes 3, not even 4) is currently completely unusable on
Mac, so I sent a patch to fix this:

        https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=791174

I know my patch is suboptimal, but to make this clear: it does not address a
minor bug, this bug is a real show stopper on Mac, and this change is purely
gtk internal. Of course it is not a clean solution, but there is no reason to
simply apply this patch (at a bare minimum at least to the gtk3/stable branch)
with a FIXME comment for now so that people on Mac can finally start using gtk3
at all.

I really have to agree. One of my bugs I raised in 2004 - which involves data loss - is still open. I submitted a patch ( which was difficult at the time - I only dabble in C when I absolutely have to ) which received very little feedback, and the bug has rotted since. I believe it exists in gtk+ versions 2 and 3, but I removed support for GtkComboBoxEntry widgets from all my code when porting to version 3 to avoid the issue entirely.

"Send a patch" only goes so far. If patches don't get reviewed, or don't get sufficient feedback, and never get accepted, what's the point in sending patches?

Dan


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