Re: deprecation?

[Bill Haneman <Bill Haneman Sun COM>]

Jeff Waugh wrote:

> <quote who="Bill Haneman">
>
>  
>
> > I wholeheartedly agree with Murray here.  We should not
> >
> > a) threaten to remove stable ABI;
> > b) remove stable ABI, violating our stability guarantees;
> > c) make ANY deprecation announcement to the external developer community 
> > before suitable replacements have been made available and given soak time.
> >    
>
> I'm fine with changing the wording, but we need to make the issue clear. We
> have not deprecated any of this stuff yet, but we should NOT be encouraging
> developers to use it. In answer to your points:
>
>  a) So how do we make it clear that we do not recommend the use of these
>  parts of the platform, given that we have had no confidence in them for
>  quite some time now?
>  
If they are both "part of platform" and "broken", then the appropriate 
course of action is to FIX them.  That's the cost of putting things in 
platform.

>  b) We're not removing stable ABI, or threatening to do so. We're saying
>  quite clearly that these libraries will be deprecated soon.
>  
Which, then, means what?  If this means that the implied guarantee (that 
our APIs are expected to work!) is bdeing removed or diluted, it means 
making stable API become unsupported.  In the real world that means "we 
are probably going to break this stuff by accident, so don't come crying 
when we do".  That is not acceptable in conjunction with an ABI 
stability guarantee.  "We will keep it around even when it breaks" is 
not a very reassuring "guarantee".  If bugs against deprecated API get 
closed as WONTFIX or OBSOLETE (as they do!) then deprecation is not an 
acceptable path for such ABI in a stable release series (i.e. gnome 2.X).

>  c) We're not making a deprecation announcement.
>  
Yes, you seem to be announcing impending deprecation, which is IMO just 
as bad, when no replacement is available.

Bill

> - Jeff
>
>