D versionning

[SomeDude]

On Monday, 16 July 2012 at 14:28:45 UTC, Jesse Phillips wrote:
> On Monday, 16 July 2012 at 06:05:43 UTC, Walter Bright wrote:
>
>> I've had a lot of my own working D code break because of name 
>> changes in Phobos. This is extremely annoying. I can fully 
>> understand that it drives people away. It's got to stop.
>
> Name changes have been the least annoying breaking change I've 
> come across from using D. Language design being the biggest.
>
> Luckily I've expected that, and recently hit has been very 
> infrequent. There are still changes that will be making big 
> ripples (actually maybe not so much if we are changing how we 
> handle toHash...). Maybe this unstable branch thing will allow 
> us to make a bunch of a breaking changes together when we have 
> one of these required disruptions.

I don't think the unstable branch should give you the false idea 
that you are free to make breaking changes, because in the end, 
they will be incorporated in the stable branch, breaking code, or 
the users will be stuck. So although there may be *some* breaking 
changes, they should stay relatively limited. Each breaking 
change should increment the x number in the 2.x.y scheme. So if 
the x moves too quickly, the stabe and unstable branches will 
quickly diverge to become unreconciliable.