Re: [boost] El Capitan issues (Was: [1.61] Two weeks remaining for new libraries and breaking changes)

Subject: Re: [boost] El Capitan issues (Was: [1.61] Two weeks remaining for new libraries and breaking changes)
From: Robert Ramey (ramey_at_[hidden])
Date: 2016-02-16 14:45:18

On 2/16/16 11:08 AM, Edward Diener wrote:

>> Sorry, the suggestion is that on the develop test matrix, each library
>> be tested on the develop branch against the other libraries on the
>> master branch.  This would permit a developer to make an innocent
>> mistake without bringing down the whole system.
>
> This creates a problem when code in one library in the 'develop' branch
> depends on code in another library in the 'develop' branch.

I think this is an exceedingly rare occurrence and I doubt that it ever 
happens.

If I'm working on library A and it depends on library B, I'm looking at 
library B's documented API.  This is on the master branch. I can't know 
what the developer API is thinking.  Unless I'm in some sort of intimate 
contact with him, I can't know what features he's including that I need 
to use right now.

> I think this
> situation is far more likely than code in one library in the 'develop'
> branch having to wait until code in another library it may depend on is
> promoted to the 'master' branch of that library.

I disagree. see above.

This situation occurs on a regular basis.  It's the situation right now 
as I write this.  Date/Time library uses the serialization library which 
uses spirit/classic which now has a bug so it's holding up testing on 
serialization, date-time and any others which include serialization support.

> Therefore while I
> understand the greater stability of testing the 'develop' branch of a
> library against the 'master' branch of all other libraries I am opposed
> to this sort of testing as a practical regression testing solution.

noted:
>
> Ideally we should have a testing system where one could specify for any
> given library its library dependencies, and one could also specify which
> branch of each library dependency we want to test against. But we are a
> long way from such a system at present.

I don't think that this would be worth the effort required.

Robert Ramey