Re: Removal of python1.5?
On Mon, Dec 10, 2001 at 11:44:27PM +1000, Anthony Towns wrote:
> On Mon, Dec 10, 2001 at 07:22:36AM +0100, Matthias Klose wrote:
> > Anthony Towns writes:
> > > python1.5's still useful to users, isn't it, especially ones with
> > > important python programs
> > that was the precondition for the removal. Currently there are xtalk
> > and python-pam. I do not count pydb, because a debugger for the old
> > version alone doesn't make sense.
>
> I mean for people who haven't managed to port their *own* (unpackaged) apps
> to python 2.x.
>
> Considering this list just went through convincing me that this *wasn't*
> a trivial matter, I hope you're not going to go changing your minds on me
> now.
For what its worth, probably very little, I agree with aj. I have a
zope 2.3 site. My best guess is that to upgrade it to zope2.4 is going
to be a three day (24 working hour) process. I cannot just take it down
for three days at my convenience. This will have to wait until there is
a plant shutdown.
I suspect that anyone who has a lot of labor invested in zope 2.3 is in
a similar circumstance. I am not sure that the upgrade process has been,
nor even can be, fully automated; particularly if the user still has
the older pythonscripts, rather than the Script (Python).
For similar reasons, I can see someone beginning a migration to zope 2.4
and then having to backtrack to 2.3 to get the site back on-line fast
enough. In fact, I would have been far more comfortable had zope been
versioned, so that both a 2.3 and a 2.4 could exist concurrently. This
would make site migration far easier, as the older site could be peeled
off folder by folder and tested that way, with less fear of major
disruption.
If we are to argue that python is "mission critical" and that "mission
critical applications" are to be built on it; then we have to behave
that way. And one implication of this is that we have to be very
conservative in dropping old major releases. A two year lead time
notice seems not at all unreasonable. That is, put a prominent notice
that the package will be withdrawn two years from now. Put in in both
the Debian README, and in the python-doc front page.
Then, if someone comes back whining that their application no longer
works after that date, well, at least they will have been put firmly
on notice of the deadline, with enough lead time to do something
about it.
Jim Penny
BTW: I have no feeling about dropping python-2.0; it appears that
portation from 2.0 to 2.1 is mostly very easy, and that there is no
strong reason to keep 2.0 in Debian.
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