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In-Reply-To: <580781A9-5109-4B76-861A-4F9FCB6ABA61@koalephant.com>
Date: Thu, 10 Oct 2019 22:40:50 -0700
Message-ID: <CAMPTd_Aon4mwvHqs44FTJabc2V14yv5dhjEnskhTYKY0Da5Gng@mail.gmail.com>
To: Stephen Reay <stephen@koalephant.com>
Cc: Chase Peeler <chasepeeler@gmail.com>, PHP internals <internals@lists.php.net>
Content-Type: multipart/alternative; boundary="00000000000094660f05949bf64c"
Subject: Re: [PHP-DEV] Internals "camps"
From: walterp@gmail.com (Walter Parker)

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G

On Thu, Oct 10, 2019 at 10:10 PM Stephen Reay <stephen@koalephant.com>
wrote:

>
>
> > On 11 Oct 2019, at 02:59, Walter Parker <walterp@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > On Thu, Oct 10, 2019 at 10:36 AM Chase Peeler <chasepeeler@gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >
> >>
> >>
> >> On Thu, Oct 10, 2019 at 1:30 PM Walter Parker <walterp@gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >>
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>> No. The compromise is funding a ferry system. Or laying Internet
> between
> >>>> them. Or a passenger pigeon mail route.
> >>>>
> >>>> Sometimes compromise requires deep discussion about the motivations
> for
> >>>> each side and coming to a lateral, mutually acceptable, solution.
> >>>>
> >>>> But we'd rather not discuss motivations and just bicker about the
> >>> surface
> >>>> results. I.e., argue the X, rather than the Y, of these little XY
> >>> problems
> >>>> we're solving.
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>> Build a ferry system is alternative to building bridge. I can see tha=
t
> as
> >>> a
> >>> compromise, I can also see that as a separate project created to serv=
e
> >>> demand after the the bridge project is rejected. Where a ferry system
> is
> >>> started because there is still demand for transit, just not enough
> demand
> >>> to pay for a bridge.
> >>>
> >>> With respect to the backtick proposal, what is the "ferry" project? D=
o
> we
> >>> have to come up with one before we can cancel the "bridge" project or
> can
> >>> we cancel the "bridge" project on its own merits and then discuss a
> future
> >>> project that solves the actual underlying problem?
> >>>
> >>> "Ferry" projects might be: more/better training on PHP, better
> >>> documentation so that the backtick is no longer an "obscure" feature =
to
> >>> those that don't have a shell/Unix/Perl background, tooling to warn
> people
> >>> when they misuse this feature.
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >> To the side that says "There is absolutely no reason we need to go to,
> or
> >> communicate with, the island in the first place," a ferry project isn'=
t
> a
> >> compromise. The position of the "anti-bridge" builders isn't because
> they
> >> are against building bridges - it's because they are against spending
> >> resources on attempts to get to the island in the first place. The oth=
er
> >> side might have valid arguments on why we need to get to the island,
> but,
> >> just proposing different ways to get there isn't compromising with the
> side
> >> that doesn't want to go there.
> >>
> >
> > I think you may have just created a strawman for the anti-bridge
> position.
> > There are famous anti-bridge cases, like the Bridge to Nowhere in Alask=
a
> > (if you don't remember, there was an island in Alaska that had 50 peopl=
e
> > and Senator Stevens wanted to replace the existing ferry system with a
> $398
> > million bridge). People complained about the bridge not because they
> wanted
> > the islanders to to isolated, but because it was poor use of money when
> > there where bigger and more urgent problems.
> >
> > To bring this back to PHP, is the backtick really a urgent problem of
> > enough magnitude that it justifies the cost of a BC break in unknown
> amount
> > of PHP code that has been functional for years. If this proposal passes
> > (and the follow up to remove it which I'm certain will be proposed), th=
en
> > this is one that leaves people on the island as they will either be stu=
ck
> > on an old version of PHP or have to pay to update the code. This pushes
> the
> > costs on them to solve a an existing issue that 20 years after it was
> > created and is now an issue because a new generation of coders, unaware
> of
> > history, find the existing syntax not to there taste/a poor design. Why
> are
> > we giving priority to people that haven't taken the time to educate
> > themselves over people that did and used programming style that used to
> > common?
> >
> >
> >>
> >>
> >>> Walter
> >>>
> >>> --
> >>> The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men
> of
> >>> zeal, well-meaning but without understanding.   -- Justice Louis D.
> >>> Brandeis
> >>>
> >>
> >>
> >> --
> >> Chase Peeler
> >> chasepeeler@gmail.com
> >>
> >
> >
> > --
> > The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men o=
f
> > zeal, well-meaning but without understanding.   -- Justice Louis D.
> Brandeis
>
>
> Hi Walter,
>
> The RFC at the centre of this ridiculous string of analogies is about one
> thing: deprecate (i.e. show a deprecation message) about the backtick
> operator.
>
> The RFC specifically doesn=E2=80=99t lay out a timeline for actual remova=
l, it
> doesn=E2=80=99t even hint at =E2=80=9Cwell it=E2=80=99ll just be automati=
cally removed=E2=80=9D.
>
I find disingenuous, the author of the RFC has said more than once that
removal is a goal of his. I think it  is perfectly fair to look ahead and
view the process as a whole (the end goal). When walking to the edge of a
cliff, we don=E2=80=99t have to wait until we get to the edge to understand=
 that
waking off the cliff is a mistake.


> So this RFC breaks *nothing*.
>
> Yes, it does lead to the situation where it=E2=80=99s likely that a follo=
wup RFC
> will propose removing the (then) deprecated feature - perhaps 9.0, perhap=
s
> it=E2=80=99ll be discussed pre-9.0, and held off until 10.0? But any such=
 change
> will then require *another* vote, with another round of discussions and n=
o
> doubt ridiculous analogies.
>
> And at that time, after several years of warnings about deprecation,
> Nikita or someone else will likely pop up with some analysis of projects =
to
> show usage *at the time*.
>
> If the only reason to keep a dangerous operator is =E2=80=9Cwell a small =
subset of
> people use it=E2=80=9D, marking it as *deprecated* is how you signal to t=
hose
> people that the feature will likely be removed in a future version.
>
>
Now you are assuming the conclusion. Once of the main debates here is if
the backtick is a dangerous thing. That has still to to be proven to many
people.


> The argument about =E2=80=9Cshell style scripts=E2=80=9D that are on a se=
rver which
> constantly gets updated to the newest release but never gets any
> maintenance to the scripts is a ridiculous fantasy.
>
> There is zero chance someone is dist-upgrading from one release to the
> next through enough versions that they get to one where the distro-provid=
ed
> php is such that backticks are actually removed, and yet the only thing
> that breaks is the backticks.
>
>
>
> To be honest, what I really care about is people not breaking the PHP
applications that I=E2=80=99m currently using (Roundcube, phpmyadmin, Wordp=
ress ).
I know that in the past I spent enough time fixing PHP code that stopped
working because of yet another BC change. That pace has slowed down in
recent years. If you and others really don=E2=80=99t think this is a proble=
m, I=E2=80=99ll
let you and those others fix the issues in the future as they are unlikely
to effect me. Just don=E2=80=99t say =E2=80=9Cwe didn=E2=80=99t see it comi=
ng=E2=80=9D. If I=E2=80=99m wrong, them
I=E2=80=99m wrong and feel to follow up with me in the last 2020=E2=80=99s =
when we know
what has actually happened.

Personally, I=E2=80=99m thinking of moving my backend work to something els=
e, like
Go. Rob and his team seem to have a good handle on things.


Cheers
>
>
> Stephen



Good luck, hope you don=E2=80=99t eventually cause too much pain and troubl=
e with
the BC breaks over the next few years.


Walter

> --
The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of
zeal, well-meaning but without understanding.   -- Justice Louis D. Brandei=
s

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