Re: The new Boost 17.0.0

From: Ville Voutilainen (ville.voutilainen_at_[hidden])
Date: 2020-12-02 17:35:52

On Wed, 2 Dec 2020 at 17:58, Jeff Garland via Boost
<boost_at_[hidden]> wrote:
> It doesn't need to define ABI for it to be real -- the library implementers
> are very aggressive in limiting ABI breaks.  The former LEWG chair (Titus)
> was quite vocal in wanting to remove this constraint leading to vigorous
> debates and a vote which basically affirmed that the committee was very
> split on the matter, but preferred stability.

ABI breaks shift the burden and pain downstream. There's a curious
correlation between
the amount of downstream levels that some developers have and their
reluctance to break
ABI when they can avoid it. There's a non-zero amount of users to whom
the lack of ABI
stability in boost is a reason not to touch boost with a ten-foot
pole. "Breaking ABI like mad"
is nice and fine if all your users are developers that like rebuilding
their world often.
When the vast majority of your users are not developers, the situation
may be quite different.
And that difference multiplies when you're trying to provide libraries
for users who provide
them combined with something else to other downstream users further
apart from you
the upstream library vendor.