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Date: Wed, 14 Jan 2009 14:22:42 -0800
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Subject: [RFC] build IDs proposal
From: stas@zend.com (Stanislav Malyshev)

Hi!

As many of you know, one can build PHP engine in a number of ways which 
are binary-incompatible - debug/no debug, thread-safe/not thread safe, 
etc. Also, for windows we have now anther dimension - we could build 
with VC6, VC8, VC9, etc. Loading modules built with another, binary 
incompatible version, could lead to crashes and malfunctions, thus Zend 
extension and PHP extension loaders check these options, stored in 
special structure, to match module ones with engine ones.
Now the problem is that when we need to add dimensions, we will have to 
change structures and maybe even edit some extensions, and as we have 
more dimensions it becomes less manageable and more "hackish".

I think that it would be better if we adopted more clean and scalable 
solution for that. I propose having one string build ID, which would 
look something like: "API20071006,NTS,Debug,VC8" and would be rquired to 
match exactly in the engine and the module. This should be relatively 
easy to generate when compiling.
Pro:
1. Easy, robust and scalable way to match current and any future build 
flavors
2. You can easily create "private" build flavors when testing 
binary-incompatible changes
3. Build data is in readable form even inside binary, so binaries could 
be automatically checked by Unix tools.
Contra:
1. Well, it's change :)

What do you think?
-- 
Stanislav Malyshev, Zend Software Architect
stas@zend.com   http://www.zend.com/
(408)253-8829   MSN: stas@zend.com