Apologies, sending to the list.
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Govind Salinas <blix@sophiasuchtig.com>
Date: Jan 26, 2008 4:53 PM
Subject: Re: [ANNOUNCE] Pyrite project.
To: Johannes Schindelin <Johannes.Schindelin@gmx.de>
On 1/26/08, Johannes Schindelin <Johannes.Schindelin@gmx.de> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> On Sat, 26 Jan 2008, Govind Salinas wrote:
>
> > On 1/26/08, Johannes Schindelin <Johannes.Schindelin@gmx.de> wrote:
> >
> > > On Sat, 26 Jan 2008, Govind Salinas wrote:
> > >
> > > > On 1/26/08, Johannes Schindelin <Johannes.Schindelin@gmx.de> wrote:
> > > >
> > > > > Govind wrote:
> > > > >
> > > > > > 3. Start stripping away non-performance-critical C code and
> > > > > > convert it to python code to help interoperate with
> > > > > > extensions and GUIs
> > > > >
> > > > > I am absolutely no fan of "extensions". You keep breaking other
> > > > > people's code if your core introduces changes; see for example the
> > > > > libgit.a issue with cgit.
> > > >
> > > > The nice thing about extensions is that you don't have to use them
> > > > if you don't want to.
> > >
> > > I know what the nice thing about extensions is. My point was that
> > > there is also a pretty nasty side. One that I am not prepared to
> > > accept easily.
> >
> > There is another benefit too. Have a bit of code that might be
> > dangerous? Put it in an extension and it can be tested in isolation,
> > without the need to rebuild the project (for people that offer to test
> > for you). Once it is ready and tested for general use, it can
> > beincorporated into the standard.
>
> We have branches for that. We don't even need an extension mechanism.
If you have branches, you still need to pull the code and build it. Extensions
allow you to deliver functionality at will. You can also deliver things with
the standard distribution that not all users will want. Imagine you had an
extension to deal with cross platform issues like the case-sensitivity and
unicode decomposing on OSX. People who don't need this, don't ever
incur the extra overhead. People doing cross-platform can load them
and people who aren't, don't have to.
YMMV
-Govind