Bug 1803, Upcoming breaking changes for 4.10.0-beta1

[Umberto Nicoletti]

On 8/17/06, Daniel Morissette <dmorissette at mapgears.com> wrote:
> Tamas Szekeres wrote:
> >
> >> I think you can safely hide the labelPathObj, that should not be
> >> exposed. I think the others
> >> should be immutable too (assuming I understand the problem correctly),
> >> the question is how
> >> many scripts will the change break and should backward compatability
> >> breakage be limited
> >> to major releases (e.g. 5.0).
> >>
> >
> > Those scripts are *erroneous* !  It would be desirable to force the
> > users to put them into a good shape as soon as possible.
> >
> >
>
> It seems that I should take position as release manager but
> unfortunately I do not know or use SWIG MapScript much so I have to rely
> on those who know to make an opinion on whether the current stuff is
> dangerous enough to warrant breaking a few scripts with 4.10.
>
> Based on the understanding I have of the problem from reading this
> thread and previous discussions, it seems to me that if those scripts
> are doing something that is just waiting to bomb then changing SWIG
> MapScript in v4.10 to make those object references immutable is not a
> backwards compatibility issue, it is a bugfix and a service we are
> making to those users by forcing them to fix their scripts... and in the
> end their apps will just be more robust.
>

Daniel,
IMO  we are talking about fixing pieces of code we are not even sure
they are broken. For instance I have some Java mapscript tests (and an
application) running just fine that add layers and classes at run time
and that's why I am so reluctant in approving this proposal. Only once
we get a test case that reproduces this errors reliably then we can go
and change the code.

Unfortunately I couldn't join the IRC meeting because I am on vacation
otherwise I'd have spoken  earlier (I am writing this on the road).

Regards,
Umberto

> The real question that I would throw at the SWIG MapScript experts is:
> "Is the practice of overwriting those object references really dangerous
> or not?"
>
> If the answer is yes then I think that solves the question and we need
> to apply the fix and force users to fix their scripts.
>
> If there are object references that can safely be overwritten (such as
> colorObj) then my opinion is that we should not touch them in 4.10.
>
> Daniel
> --
> Daniel Morissette
> http://www.mapgears.com/
>