Re: [patch] BC breakage check

Hi Stefan, Stefan Neufeind wrote:

On 20 Sep 2003 at 2:22, Greg Beaver wrote:

These changes mean that users must consider the consequences of upgrading to a major version.

But again: You can't judge about all software running on your server if you're providing webhosting-services. There are not only package- deps (that could be resolved by the installer) but various tools from various places depending on various versions. On a private computer or if you only run software that you have developed yourself (maybe corporate server) this is no problem ... but please also consider the "large scale installations" where you don't know which scripts access which versions etc. Well, my host provider tends to do public announcements when they are going to upgrade something that might affect users.

In other words, they would read the release notes for package Foo, determine that the new version 2.x is simply a rewrite that might have some effects on people's packages. The admins would send out a warning "test your apps offline with the new Foo package, we'll upgrade it in 2 weeks if nobody complains of bugs" This would work well, since pear is cross-platform. I think we can rely upon the intelligence of users and providers in this situation. Users that don't get it will struggle no matter what, but that doesn't mean they won't learn quickly after the first time. Consider it growing pains - after one incident, they'll learn how to properly test an upgrade of a pear app locally with a local pear installation. If the system works well, users will actually appreciate the assurance that they can upgrade without fear of breaking their apps, and know when they need to expect BC breakage. Greg