Code breakage is bad, and hard-to-find code breakage is worse.

[Chris Gonnerman]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Duncan Grisby" <dgrisby at uk.research.att.com>

> The thing about this change is that it is different from other changes
> there have been (that I'm aware of), in that it changes a fundamental
> part of the language semantics. Switching from the current / behaviour
> to the new proposal is not the same as _removing_ a feature -- it is
> _changing_ a feature. That is far more insidious.

We're burning a bridge here.  It really doesn't matter that there is a
backwards-compatibility *path* from / to //; the problem is that, once 
2.4 comes out, writing code using integer division portably between
versions is *very ugly*.

This has every likelyhood of causing a code fork.  I don't want to see 
that.  Several of us have proposed two-way bridges of one type or another,
but Guido has already tuned us out.

True, there is time yet, but frankly I'm worried.  I have never really
mistrusted Guido before, and I don't like it.

> In an ideal world, everyone would upgrade to new Python versions the
> moment they are released. The world just isn't like that, and people
> providing Python programs and libraries _have_ to support multiple
> Python versions.

Upgrading Python is painful, so I tend to jump versions when I do.  I'm
aware of the problem here, so I will be careful... but what about those
who don't get the message?