[Python-Dev] [RELEASED] Python 2.7 alpha 2

[Stephen J. Turnbull]

Neil Schemenauer writes:
 > On Sun, Jan 10, 2010 at 09:06:15PM -0800, Brett Cannon wrote:

 > > If people start taking the carrots we have added to 3.x and
 > > backporting them to keep the 2.x series alive you are essentially
 > > making the 3.x DOA by negating its benefits which I personally
 > > don't agree with.

Well, I think it's *worse* than that, and I don't think you really
mean "DOA", anyway.  (Feel free to correct me, of course.)

The problem I see with backporting lots of stuff, and/or adding new
features that aren't in 3.0, to 2.x is that it will make 2.x even
cruftier, when it was already crufty enough that Guido (and almost all
of python-dev) bit the bullet and said "backward compatibility is no
excuse for keeping something in 3.0".

That surely means that a lot of python-dev denizens will declare
non-support 2.x for x > 7.  It's not going to be the gradual migration
we've seen over the past few months as active people start to spend
more and more time on 3 vs. 2; it will be a watershed.  Especially if
these are new features merged from outside that the "small active
segment" doesn't know anything about.  From the users' point of view,
that amounts to a *fork*, even if it's internal and "friendly".

 > I think we have got to the heart of our disagreement. Assume that
 > some superhuman takes all the backwards compatible goodies from 3.x
 > and merges them into 2.x.

Isn't that a bit ridiculous?  I just don't see any evidence that
anything like that is going to happen.  Worse, if we *assume* it will
happen, I don't see any way to assess whether (1) Python 3 goes belly
up, (2) there's an effective fork confusing the users and draining the
energy of python-dev, or (3) everybody goes "wow!" because it's so
cool that everybody wants to keep maintaining an extra 3 branches
indefinitely.

My opinion is that given the clear direction the "small active
segment" is going, telling the users anything but what Brett proposed
is disinformation.

 > I guess I have more confidence in Python 3 than you do. I don't see
 > why Python 2.x needs to be artificially limited so that Python 3 can
 > benefit.

It's not for Python 3, which you, I, and I'm pretty sure Brett-in-his-
heart-of-hearts agree can take care of itself because it is *better*
than Python 2.  It's for Python, and for the Python community.