Re: [boost] [asio] Issues piling up

Subject: Re: [boost] [asio] Issues piling up
From: Vinnie Falco (vinnie.falco_at_[hidden])
Date: 2018-10-12 00:08:38

On Thu, Oct 11, 2018 at 3:37 PM Edward Diener via Boost
<boost_at_[hidden]> wrote:
> Just say here you would like to maintain the asio library

That's nice in theory, but Boost.Asio is generated by this script
which runs on the stand-alone version of the source code:

<https://github.com/chriskohlhoff/asio/blob/master/asio/boostify.pl>

Making changes directly to Boost.Asio would essentially cause a fork,
so this isn't really an option. Anyway as Andrey said, it should be up
to the author to decide whether to bring on a helper.

We don't have to make changes to Boost.Asio directly, we can just
submit pull requests to the stand-alone Asio for new features and bug
fixes, as these people have done:

<https://github.com/chriskohlhoff/asio/pulls>

Unfortunately, few if any of these pull requests get a response from
the maintainer, which brings us back to the problem described in the
original post...

There are quite a few useful, complete features which contributors
have taken the time to develop and submit but which have languished
with no response, sometimes for years. Examples:

Added wolfSSL Compatability for Asio instead of OpenSSL (5 months)
<https://github.com/chriskohlhoff/asio/pull/321>

LibreSSL compatibility (1 year 7 months)
<https://github.com/chriskohlhoff/asio/pull/196>

Add DTLS support to asio (2 years)
<https://github.com/chriskohlhoff/asio/pull/129>

This one in particular is so sad, people have come back periodically
to beg for attention to the issue but they are met with silence:

Fix #116: Enables ECDHE temporary parameters in ASIO SSL #
<https://github.com/chriskohlhoff/asio/pull/117>

Some of these pull requests even manage to elicit lively and
productive discussions and revisions, but there's no official
response.

It would be nice to be able to close issues in Boost.Asio which are no
longer relevant or resolved, to reduce the noise.

To be clear, I am not suggesting that someone else should maintain the
library. I am only bringing attention to the fact that there is a lack
of official responses to issues in Asio's respective repositories, and
that pull requests are often ignored. This affects me indirectly,
since Beast is built on Asio. For example, I have to keep hearing from
users about the "Boost.Coroutine is deprecated" warning:

<https://travis-ci.org/vinniefalco/beast/jobs/439893521#L1212>

This is because Asio uses Boost.Coroutine which is supposedly
deprecated. But there is an impasse between the authors of those
respective libraries (Boost.Coroutine2 requires C++11, and Asio only
requires C++03). And me and my users are the casualties.

Regards