Re: Reconsider defaults for use-package-vc-prefer-newest

[Suhail Singh <suhailsingh247@gmail.com>]

chad <yandros@gmail.com> writes:

> Isn't melpa-stable still considered harmful/to-be-avoided? That was my
> understanding
> years ago, and a quick web-search suggests that it's still basically true.

The utility of melpa-stable depends on a package maintainer's diligence.
Consider the casual suite.  It is available on melpa-stable and the
author takes care to make meaningful releases.  As a user, using
melpa-stable for those packages has utility.

The fact that a large number of authors / maintainers of melpa packages
don't show a similar level of care for their users is certainly
unfortunate.  However, that's not the fault of melpa-stable.

One might argue that melpa-stable's use of a versioning mechanism that
deviates from that of GNU and NonGNU ELPA is problematic.  I agree with
that.  However, that's not the argument being made when people label
melpa-stable as "harmful".

In any case, as long as a package author is making regular tagged
releases melpa-stable is no worse than melpa.  In fact, it has some
utility over melpa in that it presents version numbers that are suitable
for use by the package manager.

-- 
Suhail