[boost] Coordinating Boost Releases with compiler releases

Subject: [boost] Coordinating Boost Releases with compiler releases
From: Marshall Clow (mclow.lists_at_[hidden])
Date: 2019-03-14 14:53:24

In the thread "MSVC 2019 and 1.70 beta", there has been a discussion about
what to do about support for MSVC 2019, which is due to be released right
about the same time that Boost 1.70.  One person suggested that we delay
the boost release until after the MSVC release (I think the suggestion was
"May").

This general question has been discussed before (several times), since
tools get released fairly often - and so does Boost.

In general, I am not in favor of delaying boost releases in order to add
support for 'about to be released' development tools.  There are two main
reasons for this:

* There's always another compiler / tool about to be released.   Clang 8 is
imminent - currently at RC5.  GCC 9.1 is scheduled to be released in early
May.

* Boost releases happen every four months. August is not really that far
off. People who want support for tool XXXX can use "the trunk", getting it
either from git or from bintray.
[ Everyone knows about the tarballs at bintray, right?
https://dl.bintray.com/boostorg/master/ ]

Also, if we were to delay the boost release until May, then what would
happen to the August release?  The release process for 1.71.0 is scheduled
to start at the end of June.

-- Marshall