[XML-SIG] Expat 1.95.4

[Matt G.]

>From: "Fred L. Drake, Jr." <fdrake@acm.org>
>To: "Thomas B. Passin" <tpassin@comcast.net>
>CC: XML-SIG <xml-sig@python.org>
>Subject: Re: [XML-SIG] Expat 1.95.4
>Date: Thu, 11 Jul 2002 22:38:13 -0400
>
>
>Thomas B. Passin writes:
>  > If there is any potential problem with compatibility - someone using 
>the new
>  > expat with older Python code or vice-versa - would it be possible for 
>for a
>  > program to do version checking to learn if it is using a compatible 
>version?
>
>Absolutely:
>
> >>> from xml.parsers import expat
> >>> expat.EXPAT_VERSION
>'1.95.2'
> >>> expat.version_info
>(1, 95, 2)

If you're introducing incompatibilities, shouldn't you increment the major 
rev?  Non-incompatible new functionality should result in an increment of 
the minor revision - not the patch rev.  Otherwise, there's no systematic 
way to determine compatibility.

...or is there some sort of completely different versioning system used for 
Python modules/packages?  I have a hard time imagining how the problem could 
be solved any better than by the 'COMPATIBILITY.FEATURES.FIXES' scheme, 
though.


BTW, it would be nice to see some shared-library style scheme, to allow 
programs to use the most up-to-date of the compatible installed versions of 
a given .py.  I was recently frustrated to see that distutils doesn't really 
seem to support this model.


Matt Gruenke


_________________________________________________________________
Chat with friends online, try MSN Messenger: http://messenger.msn.com