Date: Thu, 19 Oct 1995 11:57:22 -0700 (MST) From: Terry Lambert <terry@lambert.org> To: kaleb@x.org (Kaleb S. KEITHLEY) Cc: terry@lambert.org, hackers@freefall.freebsd.org Subject: Re: xterm dumps core Message-ID: <199510191857.LAA03125@phaeton.artisoft.com> In-Reply-To: <199510191206.IAA01880@exalt.x.org> from "Kaleb S. KEITHLEY" at Oct 19, 95 08:06:54 am
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> >The backward compatability won't be an issue for the Pure BSD environemnt; > > How naive are you? I know at least two people who don't run a "pure > FreeBSD" environment. Andrey and I both use X. The only reason I know > that Andrey runs X is because he has broken backwards compatibility and > now his xterm dumps core. As long as the locale data on the machine matches the environment variables on the machine (something you have to have now anyway, even to get a bogus name to work), then it will work. > I believe that the average user thinks he or she can just upgrade FreeBSD > and continue using the rest of his or her installed software without > change. I don't think that's an unreasonable expectation. Backward > compatibility will certainly be an issue for those who don't/can't/won't > upgrade their XFree86 with the new XFree86-plus-FreeBSD-2.1-changes at the > same time they upgrade FreeBSD. Certainly, they must upgrade their alias database, but that's true of the proprietary naming on some vendors systems anyway. > It's all well and good to say that people should just automatically do > the upgrade, but one need only look at the molassis-like pace at which > people are moving from XFree86 3.1.1 to 3.1.2 as evidence that there is > considerable resistance to changes like that. Well, you did too good a job with 3.1.1, and you don't fix what isn't broken. 8-). > >if X throws around only official names internally for things like font > >selection, then he should be safe dropping non-RFC 7000 locales entirely. > > Define safe. By dropping legacy FreeBSD locale names (in preference for > RFC 7000 names) without providing a transitional period during which > backwards compatiblity is maintained, he is going to either break a lot > of people's work environments, or he is going to force them to upgrade > XFree86. Safe, as in "having a reasonable expectation of continued function". This would be a bigger problem, I guess, if in place upgrades worked very, very reliably. Eventually it will be a problem, but that's all the more reason to address the issue *now*. The only environments I see breaking are those with applications with hard coded strings in them. An in-place upgrade, as long as it hit the environment variables, the data files, and the X aliases file, should function without error. > And FWIW, X does only "throw around" official names. Fonts use XLFD names; > XLFD is an X Consortium standard. X locale names are registered names in > the X Consortium Registry, the were chosen by X Consortium members, i.e. > companies like Sony, Fujitsu, NEC, and Okidata, and OMRON, just to name > a few. Fine; then there's no external represenation problems that can't be fixed via the aliases file. Terry Lambert terry@lambert.org --- Any opinions in this posting are my own and not those of my present or previous employers.
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