Re: Stable code with unstable dependancies.

Cipriano Groenendal wrote:

Hello list. First, sorry if this' come up before, but it's something I just noticed. I know that one of PEAR's main goals is high stability in the code contained within its ports, so I was kind of surprised when I noticed this just now. Packages can be declared stable while they still depend upon unstable code. I tested this just now with some packages that called itself stable, but depnded upon something that was not yet declared stable. IMHO this should not be allowed. It's comparable to building a house on unstable ground. The house may be built sturdy, but that'll do you much good when an earthquake comes by and eats your land ;) The same goes for packages. Stable status should mean a package is 100% tested and known to work as expected. yet in depending upon source that(AFAIK) hasn't ever bene declared stable, this would not be possible. Here are /some/ examples that I noticed after installing everything ``pear download-all'' downloaded for me.

DB_DataObject        1.2          stable  => Depends upon
Validate             0.2.0        alpha

Fixed in CVS - Validate is now an optional dependancy.

Regards Alan

HTML_Select_Common   1.1          stable  => Depends upon
I18N                 0.8.6        beta

HTML_Template_Xipe   1.7.4        stable => Depends upon
Tree                 0.2.4        beta

Should something be done about packages like this? IMHO the installer should, with preferred-state set to stable only download stable packages, unless it's -forced. Even better would be if packages depending upon something unstable could never reach the Stable condition unless all its dependencies would be. The same requirements could be made for the Alpha/Beta/Devel levels of stability. Cipriano Groenendal