Booleans, integer division, backwards compatibility; where is Python going?

[Philip Swartzleonard]

Paul Boddie || Tue 09 Apr 2002 01:12:17a:

> Guido van Rossum <guido at python.org> wrote in message
> news:<3CB1CEC0.F324F480 at python.org>... 
>>
>> Paul wrote:
>> >
>> > As far as the 2.2 features are concerned, they seem to have a
>> > reputation in certain circles as being badly-defined, immature and
>> > "best steered clear of until later".
>> 
>> Huh?  I'm not sure where you heard that.  Alex Martelli himself just
>> told me that he is using it and considers it stable.  Maybe the
>> people who say this themselves deserve a reputation as immature and
>> "best steered clear of"?
> 
> Perhaps their views were tainted by the need to support releases of
> Python lower than 2.2. I'm sure that there are many nice features
> which reduce the amount of code (along with the complexity of the
> code) substantially in Python 2.2, but it isn't always fair to expect
> everyone to upgrade Python every time someone releases a new piece of
> software.
> 
> Even though I use 2.0 and only have 2.1 to hand because an increasing
> number of packages required it over time (most of which I only
> evaluated anyway), I couldn't see why I also had to install 2.2 when
> it was released because the odd package required it, arguably on an
> unnecessarily frivolous basis.
> 
> I suppose one argument against a "super upgrade" is that backwards
> compatibility is readily abandoned (by package authors), but then,
> regardless of the scale of the differences between releases, I would
> estimate that there is still a fair amount of coding for compatibility
> on a number of the larger Python projects. (Although PyXML's support
> for Python 1.5.2 is possibly too heroic to be practical any more.)

Huh? Your argument is all well and good, but what does supporing 
releases earlier than 2.2 have to do with it's new features being badly 
defined and immature themselves?

-- 
Philip Sw "Starweaver" [rasx] :: www.rubydragon.com