[stdlib-sig] standardizing the deprecation policy (and how noisy they are)

[Laura Creighton]

In a message of Mon, 09 Nov 2009 17:35:35 +1100, Ben Finney writes:
>Laura Creighton <lac at openend.se> writes:
>
>> So constantly spitting out DeprecationWarnings as soon as something
>> becomes deprecated is a most excellent way to train people to ignore
>> DeprecationWarnings.
>[…]
>
>> Teaching people to run their code through some sort of code-checker
>> every so often strikes me as more likely to be [helpful].
>
>Why is one of these helpful but the other one not so? Why can't the run
>your code through a code-checker remain as easy as running the code
>with the next version of Python?
>

>Ben Finney

Because casual programmers are not motivated to go after Deprecation
Warnings and modify their code to make such things go away. They're
coding to a different standard, one where you don't go off and change
things unless you absolutely have to.  So lots of DeprecationWarnings
will only train them to ignore DeprecationWarnings, or all Warnings.

Laura