Changing a cl-defstruct definition in a published package

["Clément Pit-Claudel" <cpitclaudel@gmail.com>]

Hi all,

I'm sure this has already been discussed, but I couldn't find the relevant discussion.  I'm running into issues trying to update a package without breaking other packages that depend on it.  Advice would be very welcome.

I maintain package A, which contains this:

  (cl-defstruct aaa-info
    line message)
  
  (provide 'aaa)

Someone else wrote a package B that contains this:

  (require 'aaa)

  (defun bbb-print-message (info)
    (message (aaa-info-message info)))

  (provide 'bbb)

Users have installed both packages through package.el.  I update A by adding a new field to the definition of aaa-info, and push the update to ELPA or MELPA:

  (cl-defstruct aaa-info
    line column message)

Users update using package.el, but this does not cause b to be recompiled.  From this point on, any subsequent call to bbb-print-message to bbb-print-message fails: for example, (bbb-print-message (make-aaa-info :line 1 :column 2 :message "XYZ")) prints this:

  Debugger entered--Lisp error: (wrong-type-argument stringp 2)
    message(2)
    bbb-print-message(#s(aaa-info :line 1 :column 2 :message "XYZ"))

Similarly, if I update the constructor of aaa-info to give the new 'column' field a default value, instances created by the previously-compiled B will still be missing the 'column' slot, leading to all sorts of errors.

What is the recommended way to change a cl-defstruct definition without running into these issues?

Thanks!
Clément.