If you are happy with the direction of Ruby 1.8.7+, respond

[Gregory Brown]

I am setting up two threads in the hopes that we can see names
attached to opinions about the decision to break backwards
compatibility between Ruby 1.8.6 and Ruby 1.8.7+
This one is for those who wish that Ruby 1.8 would go *back* to being
1.8.6 compatible in Ruby 1.8.8. If you agree with this, share your
thoughts or at least a simple '+1'. If you disagree, please find the
other thread titled 'If you are happy with the direction of Ruby
1.8.7, respond'. If you are in the middle, I don't know what you
should do... write two posts?

My goal is to survey ruby-talk so that the core Ruby team has a chance
to see what people really want. I'm curious to see if this is as
one-sided as I think it is.

 

[Gregory Brown]

Whoops, regretting this idea already, but I need to correct this:

This thread is for if you are *happy* with the backports from Ruby 1.9
and want to see more. If you agree, share your thoughts.
If you disagree, please find the 'if you are unhappy with the
direction of 1.8.7+' post.

 

[Gregory Brown]

+1, even though you failed at changing the text of this mail compared
to the other one.

Noticed that just after I posted, sorry.

 

[David Masover]

I'm writing two posts.

A side effect of 1.8.7 is, it sort of pulls the rug out from under
people wanting to stay on the older, stable version. I really don't see
a reason why 1.8 shouldn't have features like Symbol#to_proc, or
Object#tap, or the other things I like from 1.9 -- even some of the
syntax seems harmless, and unlikely to break anything.

Also, as a user, it seems everything I try works on 1.8.7, while not
everything works on 1.9 yet. So either it really is a gentler upgrade,
or people are feeling compelled to have their gems working on the latest
stable version. So in cases where I can't use 1.9, I can at least get
closer.

 

[John Carter]

My goal is to survey ruby-talk so that the core Ruby team has a chance
to see what people really want. I'm curious to see if this is as
one-sided as I think it is.

Always make forward progress. I'm happy to move to 1.91 and beyond
asap.

That's why I have a really good suite of unit tests. To catch most of
that class of breakage.



John Carter Phone : (64)(3) 358 6639
Tait Electronics Fax : (64)(3) 359 4632
PO Box 1645 Christchurch Email : (e-mail address removed)
New Zealand

 

[Gregory Brown]

Always make forward progress. I'm happy to move to 1.91 and beyond
asap.

This isn't about Ruby 1.9.1. I'm all for that migration too. (My book
"Ruby Best Practices" is on Ruby 1.9.1 *only*)
I'm talking specifically about the 1.8 branch here.

-greg

 

[Daniel Berger]

I am setting up two threads in the hopes that we can see names
attached to opinions about the decision to break backwards
compatibility between Ruby 1.8.6 and Ruby 1.8.7+
This one is for those who wish that Ruby 1.8 would go *back* to being
1.8.6 compatible in Ruby 1.8.8. =A0 If you agree with this, share your
thoughts or at least a simple '+1'. =A0If you disagree, please find the
other thread titled 'If you are happy with the direction of Ruby
1.8.7, respond'. =A0If you are in the middle, I don't know what you
should do... write two posts?

My goal is to survey ruby-talk so that the core Ruby team has a chance
to see what people really want. =A0I'm curious to see if this is as
one-sided as I think it is.

Given that I have my own fork, I would say the answer is no, I'm not
happy with the direction of 1.8.x.

Regards,

Dan

 

[Pit Capitain]

I am setting up two threads in the hopes that we can see names
attached to opinions about the decision to break backwards
compatibility between Ruby 1.8.6 and Ruby 1.8.7+

Can you show us some examples of 1.8.6 code that doesn't work in 1.8.7?

Regards,
Pit

 

[Rados³aw Bu³at]

Can you show us some examples of 1.8.6 code that doesn't work in 1.8.7?

Regards,
Pit

h=3D{}
h[{"foo" =3D> 1}] =3D 100
p h[{"foo" =3D> 1}]

ruby 1.8.6 prints "nil", 1.8.7 prints "100".

--=20
Pozdrawiam

Rados=B3aw Bu=B3at
http://radarek.jogger.pl - m=F3j blog

 

[Pit Capitain]

h=3D{}
h[{"foo" =3D> 1}] =3D 100
p h[{"foo" =3D> 1}]

ruby 1.8.6 prints "nil", 1.8.7 prints "100".

Ah, you mean Hash#hash. Thanks a lot, I didn't know that. But this is
an example where the 1.8.7 version yields the result most people would
expect, so I see this more like a "feature" fix (not a bug fix,
because it hasn't been an official bug AFAIK). I can't imagine any
code that depends on the behaviour of 1.8.6. Or do you have an
example?

Regards,
Pit

 

[_why]

I am setting up two threads in the hopes that we can see names
attached to opinions about the decision to break backwards
compatibility between Ruby 1.8.6 and Ruby 1.8.7+

Mostly happy. I haven't seen the bogeymen reported by many people in
1.8.7. There is String#chars, but that seemed pretty easy to move
past. If there are crashes, pull out gdb and let's see them. Shoes
has had Ruby 1.8.7 within, since shortly after it was released.

Folks, I'd stay away from the heavy-handed approach with Matz. He
doesn't respond to a mob. And despite all the hype and business that
now revolves around Ruby, it's still the man's language and his life
work.

Sometimes this community feels like one of those marriages where the
lady marries the guy because she thinks she can change the guy.
But the guy's the guy! I don't know.

_why

 

[Tim Hunter]

Folks, I'd stay away from the heavy-handed approach with Matz. He
doesn't respond to a mob. And despite all the hype and business that
now revolves around Ruby, it's still the man's language and his life
work.

+1

 

[Zachary Brown]

Folks, I'd stay away from the heavy-handed approach with Matz. He
doesn't respond to a mob. And despite all the hype and business that
now revolves around Ruby, it's still the man's language and his life
work.

...
_why

+1 for either path that is taken.

 

[James Gray]

Folks, I'd stay away from the heavy-handed approach with Matz. He
doesn't respond to a mob.

I agree with this fully and I don't feel like I've joined a mob. I'm
not angry or out of control.

I'm saying the new version process scare me. It's just an FYI for
Matz and the core team. If they ignore it, well, that's how it
goes.

James Edward Gray II

 

[Gregory Brown]

Folks, I'd stay away from the heavy-handed approach with Matz. He
doesn't respond to a mob. And despite all the hype and business that
now revolves around Ruby, it's still the man's language and his life
work.

Ah, but it's not Matz's issue. I actually love Ruby 1.9.1, and every
time I ask Matz about this he says "I don't maintain 1.8".
The issue is not with change, but with change that something that was
previously labeled non-changing in a defacto way .

-greg

 

[M. Edward (Ed) Borasky]

Given that I have my own fork, I would say the answer is no, I'm not
happy with the direction of 1.8.x.

Could you give me a link to that fork?

 

[Charles Oliver Nutter]

Folks, I'd stay away from the heavy-handed approach with Matz. He
doesn't respond to a mob. And despite all the hype and business that
now revolves around Ruby, it's still the man's language and his life
work.

Sometimes this community feels like one of those marriages where the
lady marries the guy because she thinks she can change the guy.
But the guy's the guy! I don't know.

Unless, of course, the guy can be convinced that he's causing the lady
some sort of pain and seek to change himself. Quietly ignoring the
problem is what *leads* to mobs and divorces. I think what we're doing
here is entirely appropriate: raise concerns, discuss, hope for change
or compromise.

It may be Matz's language, but it's everyone's community.

- Charlie

 

[Tom Link]

Given that I have my own fork, I would say the answer is no, I'm not

happy with the direction of 1.8.x.

This is the happy thread and I'm happy with 1.8.7 -- well, sort of but
I personally like the changes I know of. I have to say though that I
find the idea to backport even more 1.9 features to 1.8 as strange as
the idea to forget about 1.8.7 and move back to 1.8.6. I'd have
expected 1.8 to be in maintenance mode after 1.9.1 was released.

 

[Rick DeNatale]

[Note: parts of this message were removed to make it a legal post.]

Ah, but it's not Matz's issue. I actually love Ruby 1.9.1, and every
time I ask Matz about this he says "I don't maintain 1.8".
The issue is not with change, but with change that something that was
previously labeled non-changing in a defacto way .

Right to the point! I too love Ruby 1.9.1 and Matz! but...

Ruby 1.8 (excluding 1.8.7) and Ruby 1.9 are really two different languages,
I can deal with that as long as I know, and can control which of the two I'm
using at any given time for any given application.

Matz ceded maintenance of the "1.8" stream and moved on to 1.9 some time
ago. The 1.8.7 release, rather than simply fixing bugs and maintaining
compatibility, was attracted by "shiny objects" from 1.9 and wreaked havoc
on some important consumers of Ruby, exacerbated by the eagerness of
downstream package maintainers to keep up without understanding the
ramifications of the breach of the implication of compatibility between
versions with the same minor version number.

Ruby 1.8.6 represents the latest version of the old Ruby language, 1.9.1 is
the latest version of the new Ruby language, Ruby 1.8.7 is a mutant which
just muddies the waters.

 

[James Coglan]

[Note: parts of this message were removed to make it a legal post.]

h={}
h[{"foo" => 1}] = 100
p h[{"foo" => 1}]

ruby 1.8.6 prints "nil", 1.8.7 prints "100".

Ah, you mean Hash#hash. Thanks a lot, I didn't know that. But this
is an example where the 1.8.7 version yields the result most people
would expect,

No it doesn't. Most people would expect 1.8.7 to yield the same
result as 1.8.6 . That is the point.

Though I fall on the 'unhappy' side, this change is clearly fine: 1.8.6
behaviour is clearly a bug and should be fixed, that's the point of bug fix
releases. Relying on buggy behaviour is a bad idea, and so is making changes
to ostensibly correct behaviour in minor releases.