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Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2014 18:38:04 +0000
To: "internals@lists.php.net" <internals@lists.php.net>
Message-ID: <EA391654-F731-4B45-9E45-EE780183EEE4@gmail.com>
Subject: RE: [PHP-DEV] [RFC] PHP 5.7
From: rowan.collins@gmail.com (Rowan Collins)

On 16 December 2014 16:44:59 GMT, Zeev Suraski <zeev@zend.com> wrote:
>as you mentioned distros lock in to a specific micro version, so if we
>introduce this deprecated messages in random micro version, we make it
>less
>likely for the users to stumble upon those deprecated messages and it
>will
>be also harder for us to communicate the upgrade path:
>
>compare:
>
>okay, you only have to install PHP 5.7 check out the deprecated
>messages in
>your error logs, fix those and you are ready to upgrade to 7.0
>
>vs
>
>okay, so install 5.6, but make sure that it is >= 5.6.x, except for
>distro
>Z, because they bumped the version but only backported the security
>fixes
>but did not include the last deprecated message and if you fixed those
>deprecated messages from your error log, you are ready to upgrade to
>7.0.
>
>
>
>[Zeev] Distros don’t bump the version number when they backport patches
>from newer versions.  It stays the same, which is why I don’t think
>there’s
>any difference between the two as far as communications is concerned. 
>It’s
>really ‘Upgrade to 5.7’ vs. ‘Upgrade to 5.6.12 or later’ – both
>messages by
>the way irrelevant to distro users (which have little or no control
>over
>the version of PHP they’re using, unless they break away from the
>standard
>distro PHP).  The people we really talk about are the people they build
>their own or otherwise obtain non-standard-distro binaries.  For them,
>I do
>believe a jump to 5.7.x will be psychologically bigger than a hop to a
>newer 5.6.x version.

If people stick with their distribution's cycle, then this is true. However, many distributions these days have active "backport" eco systems.

You're unlikely to find, say, an Ubuntu PPA offering 5.6.12 to replace 5.6.3, but you're almost certain to find one porting 5.7.0 to that same distro release. 

I don't know for sure that more conservative distros like Red Hat would be similar, but it seems more likely than not that "upgrade to 5.7" would be easier advice to follow than "upgrade to 5.6.12".

Regards,
-- 
Rowan Collins
[IMSoP]