You seem to be dismissing "clean up" as an invalid. I disagree. There are costs to keeping around deprecated APIs. That's not to say we shouldn't keep them around for a long time... we can and perhaps should. But "clean up" is just shorthand for all the maintainability, readability, and usability costs. As such, I feel it incapsulates many reasons which are sometimes difficult to express, but still valid.
With semver in place, it seems like your position could be reduced to "support major versions longer", which is a perfectly fine goal. As long as we have that, there's really no need to upgrade to the "latest", unless there's a feature that you want which is difficult to backport in a minor release. In that case, I think it's perfectly reasonable to consider the risks of upgrading and to make the choice to upgrade and have the feature or not upgrade and avoid API changes which affect you (if any). -- Christopher L Tubbs II http://gravatar.com/ctubbsii On Thu, Dec 11, 2014 at 3:19 PM, Kepner, Jeremy - 0553 - MITLL < kep...@ll.mit.edu> wrote: > So I think the bigger issue is to revisit the imperative to delete > deprecated functions (both public & private). How many instances have we > had where deleting a deprecated API (public & private) did anything more > than "clean up" the code? > > On Dec 11, 2014, at 2:39 PM, John Vines <vi...@apache.org> wrote: > > > More likely we'd have a fully backwards compatible API for each major > > version. SemVer allows for it and I think that grants us enough room for > > growth while still securing things for future releases. > > > > On Thu, Dec 11, 2014 at 2:36 PM, Adam Fuchs <afu...@apache.org> wrote: > > > >> Awesome -- ACCUMULO-2589 gets us at least halfway there. Given this, > >> what would be the challenges in having and maintaining one API project > >> for each major version ever released? > >> > >> Adam > >> > >> On Thu, Dec 11, 2014 at 2:24 PM, Josh Elser <josh.el...@gmail.com> > wrote: > >>> Adam Fuchs wrote: > >>>> > >>>> Has anybody looked into separating the public API a bit more from the > >>>> core? It seems to me that a large number of the deprecation removal > >>>> issues are related to people failing to read section 9 of the README. > >>>> It would be great if we built an API jar that people could build > >>>> against, but didn't leak internal classes. Maybe this is something we > >>>> can shoot for in the 2.0 release? > >>> > >>> > >>> Yup, this is already in the works by Christopher as a part of > >> ACCUMULO-2589. > >>> > >>> > >>>> Taking that a step further, it would be great if we released a 1.x API > >>>> compatible client jar for every 2.x or later release. Does anybody > >>>> have a feel for the maintenance costs of such a thing? Certainly > >>>> changes to configuration options and metadata table structures will > >>>> prove challenging. Given that we don't have a history of removing > >>>> functionality, this ought to at least be feasible. > >>>> > >>>> Thoughts? > >>>> > >>>> Adam > >>>> > >>>> > >>>> On Thu, Dec 11, 2014 at 1:54 PM, Jeremy Kepner<kep...@ll.mit.edu> > >> wrote: > >>>>> > >>>>> So the simple solution is to deprecate often, but remove almost > never. > >>>>> It is very rare that leaving a deprecated API in place actually has a > >>>>> negative impact. > >>>>> The code gets a little less clean, but that's fine as long as things > >> are > >>>>> clearly labeled as deprecated. > >>>>> In fact, seeing the way something used to be done can often be an > >>>>> inspiration for something new. > >>>>> If the past is deleted, then that knowledge is lost. > >>>>> > >>>>> I am not saying deleting can never happen, I am just saying that when > >> it > >>>>> does, it is because > >>>>> there absolutely no choice. Deletion to "clean up the code" > shouldn't > >> be > >>>>> a valid reason for deletion. > >>>>> > >>>>> On Thu, Dec 11, 2014 at 12:58:13PM -0500, Christopher wrote: > >>>>>> > >>>>>> I don't know that it'd be "cold comfort". We can continue to support > >> 1.x > >>>>>> for some time, if we choose. > >>>>>> > >>>>>> > >>>>>> -- > >>>>>> Christopher L Tubbs II > >>>>>> http://gravatar.com/ctubbsii > >>>>>> > >>>>>> On Thu, Dec 11, 2014 at 12:53 PM, Billie Rinaldi<bil...@apache.org> > >>>>>> wrote: > >>>>>> > >>>>>>> Actually, I wasn't suggesting anything. I was providing > elaboration > >> on > >>>>>>> what John was referring to. I imagine that stronger API guarantees > >>>>>>> will be > >>>>>>> cold comfort in the face of a 1.0 -> 2.0 upgrade. However, if we > >> had > >>>>>>> been > >>>>>>> using semver all along, there would have been much less pain for > >> users > >>>>>>> in > >>>>>>> the 1.x series. Also, adopting semver would mean that going from > 1.6 > >>>>>>> to a > >>>>>>> hypothetical 1.7 would not suffer from the same upgrade issues. I > >>>>>>> doubt > >>>>>>> that we could retroactively mitigate the differences in minor > >> versions, > >>>>>>> though, so going from 1.3/1.4/1.5 to 1.7 would still be hard. > >>>>>>> > >>>>>>> On Thu, Dec 11, 2014 at 9:11 AM, Mike Drob<mad...@cloudera.com> > >> wrote: > >>>>>>> > >>>>>>>> Billie, > >>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>> Not to be glib, but it reads like your suggestion to Jeremy for > when > >>>>>>>> we > >>>>>>>> have a 2.0.0 release (assuming semver passes) is to take option > (2) > >>>>>>>> Don't > >>>>>>>> upgrade Accumulo. > >>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>> Please correct my misunderstanding. > >>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>> Mike > >>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>> On Thu, Dec 11, 2014 at 11:07 AM, Billie Rinaldi< > bil...@apache.org> > >>>>>>>> wrote: > >>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>> To clarify John's question: if our vote to adopt semver 2.0.0 > >> passes, > >>>>>>> > >>>>>>> our > >>>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>> intention will be to no longer have breaking public API changes > >>>>>>>>> unless > >>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>> the > >>>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>> major version number is incremented, i.e. 1.x.x -> 2.x.x. An > >>>>>>>>> important > >>>>>>>>> aspect of semantic versioning is defining what is considered part > >> of > >>>>>>> > >>>>>>> the > >>>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>> public API. So if there are things you need to remain consistent > >> that > >>>>>>> > >>>>>>> are > >>>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>> not covered by Section 9 of the README, we should discuss adding > >>>>>>>>> them. > >>>>>>>>> Actually, strengthening what we consider to be the public API is > >>>>>>>>> likely > >>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>> to > >>>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>> be a separate conversation in which (I hope) we will engage the > >> user > >>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>> list. > >>>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>> On Dec 11, 2014 11:51 AM, "John Vines"<vi...@apache.org> wrote: > >>>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>>> Wouldn't this be resolved with our SemVer sqwitch? > >>>>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>>> On Thu, Dec 11, 2014 at 11:36 AM, Kepner, Jeremy - 0553 - MITLL< > >>>>>>>>>> kep...@ll.mit.edu> wrote: > >>>>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>>>> When we remove functions, do we have any official guidance to > our > >>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>> users > >>>>>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>>>> who may have built applications that use those functions? > >>>>>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>>>> Right now, the official position is that the Accumulo > developers > >>>>>>> > >>>>>>> can > >>>>>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>>>> remove based on a consensus vote. However, this provides no > >>>>>>> > >>>>>>> guidance > >>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>> to > >>>>>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>>>> users as to what they are suppose to do? As it stands, our > >> guidance > >>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>> is > >>>>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>>> that > >>>>>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>>>> they have the following choices: > >>>>>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>>>> (0) Diligently watch the Accumulo e-mail list and aggressively > >>>>>>> > >>>>>>> weigh > >>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>> in > >>>>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>>> on > >>>>>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>>>> any vote to remove functions that may impact them. > >>>>>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>>>> (1) Find someone to modify the original source code of their > >>>>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>>> applications, > >>>>>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>>>> build it, and *re-verify* the application. I emphasise the > >>>>>>> > >>>>>>> re-verify > >>>>>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>>>> because that is usually the most costly part of the process > that > >>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>> often > >>>>>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>>>> won't get approved by management. > >>>>>>>>>>> > >>>>>>>>>>> (2) Don't upgrade Accumulo. > >>>>>>>>>>> > >>> > >> > >
