Re: [Monotone-devel] Version 0.46 breaks monotone-viz and mtn-browse

[Stephen Leake]

Nuno Lucas <address@hidden> writes:

> Stephen Leake wrote:
>> Nuno Lucas <address@hidden> writes:
>>
>>> I understand that there is lack of developers for the project, but
>>> maybe it's time to stop waiting for the BIG refactoring that will
>>> solve all problems and think on just finalize what it already does
>>> right.
>>
>> I'm not aware that we are waiting for anything, we're just making
>> improvements as time and motivation allows.
>
> If that is true then this should be considered a bug. It's a
> regression.

What exactly is the regression?

"regression" means "broke something again that was fixed once".

mtn 0.46 makes a change in the mtn automate stdio protocol. Tools that
use that protocol must adapt. That's not a regression.

>>> There is that saying that good software is not the one with the great
>>> algorithms but the one that actually gets released. On open source,
>>> that doesn't apply directly, but actually having a stable version is
>>> more or less the same.
>>>
>>> I have no doubts that sooner or later mtn-browse and monotone-viz will
>>> be fixed, but this problem should not happen on a stable version
>>> release.
>>
>> All good software evolves and changes, or it dies. Look at gcc; will it
>> ever be "done"? Emacs is still making major changes to keep up with
>> the times.
>
> GCC only recently had a politic favorable to plugins. And even so, I'm
> not aware they broke the external API from minor version changes
> (although it's possible, as I'm not following that kind of
> development).

They have broken the interface between front and backends several
times. That is comparable to the mtn automate stdio protocol; it is
the interface between the GUI frontends and the mtn backend.

> Emacs, well, I'm not an Emacs person (some of those keyboard shortcuts
> are not easy on non-US keyboards and one easily gets tired of changing
> the application defaults on every new installation) 

That's what mtn is for! I keep my Emacs customizations in mtn, and
install that right after Emacs.

> but it seems there's so much time between releases, everyone has
> time to migrate. ;-)

Yes, that's true. The pace of mtn releases has slowed significantly
since I started using it, which is a good thing.

-- 
-- Stephe