[GRASS-dev] Min. req. of programming language standard support, GRASS GIS 8

[Nicklas Larsson]

On Friday, 29 January 2021, 18:50:34 CET, Anna Petrášová <kratochanna at gmail.com> wrote: 







On Thu, Jan 28, 2021 at 4:28 AM Nicklas Larsson via grass-dev <grass-dev at lists.osgeo.org> wrote:
> Dear Devs!
> 
> As a relatively new member of the GRASS GIS dev community, I have had to search for information on mailing lists, old trac comments etc. regarding coding practice and in particular minimum programming language standard support. Ending up in not entirely conclusive understanding. Up until now, I have been mostly involved in Python development and I’m still not absolutely certain, although I assume 3.5 is minimum version. And I’m not alone, see e.g. [1].
> 
> Now, I’ve encountered a similar dilemma with C standard support, attempting to address compiler warnings [2], in particular with the PR #1256 [3].
> 
> I would be great if there were a (one) place where the min support of Python version, C (C89, C99, C11, C17…) and C++ (C++03, C++11, C++14 …) standard is stated -- loud and clear. Obviously, there has to be a consensus in the community on these matters for that to happen. Such a statement will also have to be revised now and then. (A related question is also whether or not to support 32 bit, which I know have been raised recently).
> 
> I’d appreciate your opinion is on this issue!
> Let me put up a a suggestion for min. req. for coming GRASS GIS 8 as a starting point of discussion:
> - Python 3.7
> - C11
> - C++11
> 
> 
> Best regards,
> Nicklas
> 

Regarding Python, not sure if we shouldn't set 3.6 as minimum for G8, it is still used e.g. in Ubuntu 18. Any reason to set 3.7 as minimum, some specific features we would want to use?

Anna

>  
> 
> [1] https://github.com/OSGeo/grass/issues/1241
> [2] https://github.com/OSGeo/grass/issues/1247
> [3] https://github.com/OSGeo/grass/pull/1256
> 
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Well, I don’t have a very strong opinion regarding 3.7, but personally I’d say 3.6 is an absolute minimum. I presume, for example, most of us would prefer to use f-strings for string formatting.


On the other hand, 3.6 will reach end-of-support at the end of this year right after its 5th birthday party and the support for data classes in 3.7 may potentially offer intriguing applications in G8.

Ubuntu 18 has Python 3.6 and Debian 9 has Python 3.5! What will make the lowest common denominator? Debian 10 and Ubuntu 20 actually supports Python 3.7 and 3.8 respectively. Forgive me if I’m ignorant, but isn’t it possible to upgrade Python version on Ubuntu? Or is it just a pain with package dependencies? Relying on default Python has never/rarely been a luxury for other platforms.

That being said, I think the most important part of this is that the community make a clear decision on min. supported Python version.


Best,
Nicklas