Re: policy around 'wontfix' bug tag
On Mon, Feb 05, 2018 at 02:07:47PM +0100, Vincent Lefevre wrote:
> On 2018-02-04 08:22:23 -0500, Michael Stone wrote:
> > On Mon, Feb 05, 2018 at 12:48:45AM +1300, Richard Hector wrote:
> > > In which case, it should refuse to accept '4/2/2018' at all, right?
> >
> > It can't, that would break working scripts. This is the heart of the
> > problem: we know the parser is horrible, confusing, and irregular, but any
> > attempt to change it will break lots of stuff that depends on the current
> > brokenness.
>
> It is not rare that the behavior of utilities change and break
> scripts. So, why not here, in particular for a good reason?
>
It is equally common, perhaps even more so, that buggy behavior is
retained (especially if it is not harmful) and that "correct" behavior
require a switch or setting. I am not personally affected by this, as
far as I know, but as a software developer I can certainly understand
wanting to retain backward compatibility, even when it is buggy.
Regards,
-Roberto
--
Roberto C. Sánchez
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