From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Received: from mailman by lists.gnu.org with tmda-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1HRqjt-00086M-Ua for qemu-devel@nongnu.org; Thu, 15 Mar 2007 10:15:33 -0400 Received: from exim by lists.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1HRqjs-000869-E9 for qemu-devel@nongnu.org; Thu, 15 Mar 2007 10:15:33 -0400 Received: from [199.232.76.173] (helo=monty-python.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1HRqjs-000866-6r for qemu-devel@nongnu.org; Thu, 15 Mar 2007 09:15:32 -0500 Received: from mtaout03-winn.ispmail.ntl.com ([81.103.221.49]) by monty-python.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.60) (envelope-from ) id 1HRqir-0001SJ-7U for qemu-devel@nongnu.org; Thu, 15 Mar 2007 10:14:29 -0400 From: Julian Seward Subject: Re: [Qemu-devel] RFC: This project needs a stable branch Date: Thu, 15 Mar 2007 14:11:53 +0000 References: <200703151111.04453.jseward@acm.org> <45F94E97.10502@codemonkey.ws> In-Reply-To: <45F94E97.10502@codemonkey.ws> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Disposition: inline Message-Id: <200703151411.53494.jseward@acm.org> Reply-To: qemu-devel@nongnu.org List-Id: qemu-devel.nongnu.org List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , To: qemu-devel@nongnu.org On Thursday 15 March 2007 13:48, Anthony Liguori wrote: > I'm not necessarily sure I agree that a stable branch is the best thing > to have (verses aiming for never introducing regressions). Aiming for no regressions is a worthy aim, but I believe unachieveable in a project of any size. For sure it's impossible if there is ever a need to make large-scale infrastructural changes, which inevitably is occasionally the case if the project is to live a long time. For example, if the dyngen/gcc-based backend is replaced by a self-contained handwritten one, I would be amazed if there were not a few obscure regressions whilst the new backend is brought up to the same level of stability as the current one. At least, that is what I know from my own code generator hacking. J