LSARC/2008/058 - dcraw

[James Carlson]

John Plocher writes:
> Danek Duvall wrote:
> > Perhaps we could keep track of these interfaces...
> 
> If you are going to do all that, why not just do a contract - it is
> just as much work, plus it is a well known mechanism.
> 
> (I, too wish there was a better way...)

I agree with John.  I'll also go further to say that asserting that
because a project exports only Volatile interfaces it's somehow
specially eligible to import Volatile as well is a syntax error.  It
seems to belie a "FOSS == no review" scheme that just doesn't exist.

We don't evaluate dependencies based on the stability of interfaces
provided by a project.  We evaluate them based on the consolidations
across which the dependency exists.

In other words, better ways to deal with this issue are:

  - Just raise the stability level of the library to an appropriate
    level, given the consumers involved.  It's not as unstable as
    asserted.

  - Create a contract; it's how we enumerate consumers who will be
    damaged by unexpected changes.

  - Put them in the same consolidation and treat the dependency as
    effectively Consolidation Private ("Volatile friends with
    benefits").

-- 
James Carlson, Solaris Networking              <james.d.carlson at sun.com>
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