[Dbix-class] IMPORTANT: A discussion of DBIC governance and future development

[Andrew Beverley]

On Wed, 5 Oct 2016 04:07:04 -0400 David Golden <xdg at xdg.me> wrote:
[...]
> * DBIx::Class (DBIC) – Peter's work provides a capstone, with only bug
> fixes thereafter
> * DBIx::Class2 (DBIC2) – new feature development, with lower stability
> expectations
> 
> Some of the benefits I could see from this:
> 
> (1) It helps DBIC users avoid getting upgraded past a stability point
> without having to learn to pin module versions or change application
> code to use a different package name.  People have to positively
> opt-in for some risk in exchange for new features by asking for DBIC2
> explicitly.
> 
> (2) The relation between the two is more immediately obvious than
> between, say, DBIx::Class::Stable and DBIx::Class.  It also seems
> more like one project than two, particularly if both are under the
> same governance, use the same mailing list, etc.
> 
> (3) It sets a possible path forward of DBIC2 evolving new features
> for a while and then eventually moving into a bug-fix-only state
> while the next generation of new features go into a future DBIC3.
> 
> There is some precedent for "Foo" evolution going to "Foo2" such as
> Dancer/Dancer2, Test/Test2, and probably others.  Those have bigger
> disruptions from old to new than I imagine DBIC2 having (initial
> release of DBI2 probably being a carbon copy of the final version of
> DBIC), but at least its a naming pattern that people will recognize.

I'm coming round to this idea. I was originally against it as I assumed
that it would be little more than a version freeze with no ongoing
maintenance, but given the more recent discussions, I wonder whether
this might be the best solution, if:

- Riba was prepared to keep maintaining (and "tightening" in slower
time) "DBIC", with its current set of features, thereby making it a
rock-solid module, still maintained, that can be used in critical
applications which only need the current feature set.

- the previously-proposed committee creates and maintains "DBIC2",
which becomes almost a testing ground, production ready, but for those
that want to live slightly closer to the edge.

Longer term, code could be ported from DBIC2 into DBIC.

Andy