From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Eli Zaretskii Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: Windows 9X compatibility Date: Sun, 28 Mar 2010 18:56:07 +0300 Message-ID: <83eij430fc.fsf@gnu.org> References: <83634jglab.fsf@gnu.org> <831vf7ge57.fsf@gnu.org> <83y6hfeyzw.fsf@gnu.org> <83vdcig87f.fsf@gnu.org> <87k4sywpvv.fsf@stupidchicken.com> <83tys2fbxs.fsf@gnu.org> <87hbo1iubm.fsf@home.jasonrumney.net> <83ljddg0w9.fsf@gnu.org> <4BAE867D.3030404@gmail.com> <4BAE9ED4.6070900@t-online.de> <4BAEA525.20709@gmail.com> <83iq8ggbcp.fsf@gnu.org> <87mxxs3311.fsf@telefonica.net> Reply-To: Eli Zaretskii NNTP-Posting-Host: lo.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: QUOTED-PRINTABLE X-Trace: dough.gmane.org 1269791905 16805 80.91.229.12 (28 Mar 2010 15:58:25 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@dough.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Sun, 28 Mar 2010 15:58:25 +0000 (UTC) Cc: emacs-devel@gnu.org To: =?utf-8?Q?=C3=93scar_Fuentes?= Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Sun Mar 28 17:58:20 2010 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([199.232.76.165]) by lo.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1NvusV-0001Dy-On for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Sun, 28 Mar 2010 17:58:20 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1]:59139 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1NvusV-00019G-3B for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Sun, 28 Mar 2010 11:58:19 -0400 Original-Received: from mailman by lists.gnu.org with tmda-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1NvuqV-0000SQ-Vs for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Sun, 28 Mar 2010 11:56:16 -0400 Original-Received: from [140.186.70.92] (port=49977 helo=eggs.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1NvuqU-0000Ra-KG for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Sun, 28 Mar 2010 11:56:15 -0400 Original-Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1NvuqT-0000vQ-9t for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Sun, 28 Mar 2010 11:56:14 -0400 Original-Received: from mtaout22.012.net.il ([80.179.55.172]:36562) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.69) (envelope-from ) id 1NvuqT-0000vA-2x for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Sun, 28 Mar 2010 11:56:13 -0400 Original-Received: from conversion-daemon.a-mtaout22.012.net.il by a-mtaout22.012.net.il (HyperSendmail v2007.08) id <0L00003001L6SY00@a-mtaout22.012.net.il> for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Sun, 28 Mar 2010 18:56:03 +0300 (IDT) Original-Received: from HOME-C4E4A596F7 ([77.127.176.135]) by a-mtaout22.012.net.il (HyperSendmail v2007.08) with ESMTPA id <0L00000I61LE4YB0@a-mtaout22.012.net.il>; Sun, 28 Mar 2010 18:56:03 +0300 (IDT) In-reply-to: <87mxxs3311.fsf@telefonica.net> X-012-Sender: halo1@inter.net.il X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: Solaris 10 (beta) X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: "Emacs development discussions." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Original-Sender: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Errors-To: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.devel:122795 Archived-At: > From: =D3scar Fuentes > Date: Sun, 28 Mar 2010 16:59:54 +0200 >=20 > Eli Zaretskii writes: >=20 > >> Date: Sat, 27 Mar 2010 18:39:01 -0600 > >> From: Christoph > >> > >> The need is in my opinion a growing pain in the rear-end to supp= ort this=20 > >> backwards compatibility. > > > > This argument can only be persuasive if it comes from someone who > > personally experienced this pain, which could only be true if the= y are > > active maintainers of the MS-Windows port. >=20 > Maybe the fact that there are no more active maintainers of the > MS-Windows port is somewhat related to the pain in the rear that W9= X > compatbility is? Who said there are no more active maintainers? Please take a look at the ChangeLog files to have some reality check. > First, I don't have a machine for testing. Neither do I. There's no requirement to test the code on Windows 9X, only not to use code that we _know_in_advance_ will break W9X. > Second, the W9X API is so broken and has some many quirks that, > apart from the permanent browsing of the MSDN it requires, a trivia= l > change can be easily turned into a long session of mailing list > archive archeology. There's no requirements to use W9X-specific APIs. We use APIs that are available on all Windows systems, as much as possible. When that's impossible, we use the advanced APIs, and the affected Emacs features are simply not available on W9X or display an error message. We have quite a few such features already. Use of NT file security i= n file ops is one example that comes to mind; the "load average" displa= y on the mode line is another. The only requirement is to use such features in a way that doesn't crash Emacs on Windows 9X. For example, we load system libraries wit= h error checking, instead of blindly assuming they are always available= . > Third, W9X compatibility means that you either have > to refrain to implement features based on modern APIs or #ifdef the= m See above: this is false. (And #ifdef is not a solution anyway, because a run-time check is needed.) > which greatly adds to the maintenance burden. True, there is some maintenance burden, but I personally find it insignificant. The code to load a library safely and invoke function= s that may not exist is very simple, almost boilerplate, and each additional API that needs this treatment just needs more-or-less copy-pasted more of the same. Once again, I'm bewildered by the intense reaction to this issue, given the facts.