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Subject: Re: [PHP-DEV] What's our official stance on small self-contained
 additions in a micro version
From: smalyshev@gmail.com (Stanislav Malyshev)

Hi!

>     I tend to agree that it would be easier for all parties if we stop
>     adding stuff in micro versions, as it is easier to remember and

I don't think it is a good idea. Imagine you are a PHP developer working
on a project, and you noticed there's some small functionality missing
that would improve things a lot for you - like parameter to some
function or returning some value that is missing. You could easily
contribute it, but if it can't go in minor version there's no point for
you to even bother. Because even if your org is super-up-to-date, they
run 5.6, most realistically - 5.5, and if it's like the majority - it'd
be 5.4 and worse. You could hope to convince your bosses and your ops to
go to 5.6 and keep it reasonably updated within 5.6, but if the only
addition you can make is 7.1, it's the lost cause - by the time your org
could go to 7.1 your project will be long done (or at least long
designed to work without this new feature) and you may be already
working in another company. Yes, we have releases (almost) each year,
but adoption of them is much slower, and with all BC breaks in 7.0 it
would probably be even slower when going from 5 to 7, so this means
doing small improvements to PHP is essentially of no practical value for
PHP developer since there's no chance this improvement can be used in
the lifetime of a typical project.
I do not think it would be good for PHP.

> As everything can be considered as beeing a BC break for at least
> someone on Earth, I admit it is hard to understand the meaning of "small
> self-contained additions in a micro version" :-p

I do not think we should consider adding functions/options "BC break",
not by any sane definition of it. Of course, nothing prevents somebody
from using insane definitions, but it's of no concern to us.
-- 
Stas Malyshev
smalyshev@gmail.com