@wolf480pl @saddestrobots Hmmm. I choose my dependencies,...

@wolf480pl @saddestrobots Hmmm. I choose my dependencies, and part of that is evaluating their stability. I don't allow others to impose work on me, such as by requiring the stability I provide, unless they compensate me, or I feel like it.

Like 15 June at 7:32 | Wall-to-wall | Open on toot.liw.fi

4 comments

Wolf480pl

@liw @saddestrobots where do you find those stable dependencies? IIRC even gcc isn't fully backwards-compatible these days

15 June at 7:46 | Open on mstdn.io

Lars Wirzenius

@wolf480pl @saddestrobots I think you are trying to make a point, but I am entirely failing to understand what it is. However, I'm not interested in combat by debate, so I'll bow out of this discussion now.

15 June at 8:02 | Open on toot.liw.fi

Wolf480pl

@liw @saddestrobots
Sorry, that was a bit too combative on my part.

What I meant is that I find it difficult and frustrating to try to find dependencies that have similar stability guarantees to the kernel.

What's even more frustrating is that often the programming languages in which those dependencies are written aren't themselves stable.

Which is why I feel like I don't have much choice in deciding how much change comes my way from upstream.

15 June at 8:23 | Open on mstdn.io

Haelwenn /элвэн/ :triskell:

@wolf480pl @liw @saddestrobots Reminds me of why I avoid Python/Ruby/… and so by elimination ended up picking Perl (when I'm not targetting shells that conform to POSIX), because yeah the language is the biggest dependency of all.

That said I'd say C is pretty close to "linux doesn't breaks userspace" as the linux kernel actually does, but it is very very rare (mostly with old APIs being removed, or like a.out being removed), and for C it's mostly a case where you have to pay attention to warnings and use things like UBSan.

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16 June at 9:15 | Open on queer.hacktivis.me