Should non-security 2.7 bugs be fixed?

[dieter]

Mark Lawrence <breamoreboy at yahoo.co.uk> writes:
> ...
>> If the vast majority of Python programmers are focused on 2.7, why are
>> volunteers to help fix 2.7 bugs so scarce?

I have not done much work related to Python bug fixing. But, I had
bad experience with other open source projects: many of my patches
(and bug reports) have been ignored over decades. This caused me
to change my attitude: I now report bugs (sometimes with patches)
and publish a potential solution in a separate package
(--> "dm.zopepatches.*", "dm.zodbpatches.*"). This way, affected
people can use a solution even if the core developpers don't care.

>From my point of view: if you want help with fixing bugs,
you must ensure that there is a high probability that those contributions
really find their way into the main development lines.
As I understand from other messages in this thread, this is also
a problem with Python bug fixing.


>> Does they all consider it perfect (or sufficient) as is?

I have not much blame for Python 2.7. I see a few minor points

  *  "pdb" is quite weak - but I could fix some (but
     by far not all) aspects in "dm.pdb".

  *  "https" has been weakly handled in earlier versions,
     but someone has done the Python 3 backport work in
     an external package before the backport finally arrived in
     Python 2.7.

>> Should the core developers who do not personally use 2.7 stop
>> backporting, because no one cares if they do?

I am grateful that the above mentioned "https" backport
was finally integrated into Python 2.7 -- even though
I find it acceptable to use an external package to get it.

Thus, there are people who care. Of course, I will not tell
core developers that they must do backporting. If they don't
more external packages will come into existence which contain
(unofficial) backports.