[Python-Dev] Counting collisions for the win

[Ben Wolfson]

On Fri, Jan 20, 2012 at 2:11 PM, Terry Reedy <tjreedy at udel.edu> wrote:
> On 1/20/2012 2:51 PM, Donald Stufft wrote:
>
>> I think the counting collision is at best a bandaid and not a proper fix
>> stemmed from a desire to not break existing applications on a bugfix
>> release ...
>
> My opinion of counting is better than yours, but even conceding the
> theoretical, purity argument, our release process is practical as well.
> There have been a few occasions when fixes to bugs in our code have been
> delayed from a bugfix release to the next feature release -- because the fix
> would break too much code depending on the bug.

AFAICT Brett's suggestion (which had occurred to me as well, but I'm
not a core developer by any stretch) seemed to get lost in the debate:
would it be possible to go with collision counting for bugfix releases
and hash randomization for new feature releases? (Brett made it here:
<http://mail.python.org/pipermail/python-dev/2012-January/115740.html>.)

-- 
Ben Wolfson
"Human kind has used its intelligence to vary the flavour of drinks,
which may be sweet, aromatic, fermented or spirit-based. ... Family
and social life also offer numerous other occasions to consume drinks
for pleasure." [Larousse, "Drink" entry]