Re: guile-lib - devel branch - patch 4 of 11

[Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>]

> Date: Tue, 19 Jul 2016 20:53:44 -0300
> From: David Pirotte <david@altosw.be>
> Cc: guile-devel@gnu.org
> 
> > > > > 2.69 is the latest stable, available since April 2012  
> 
> > > > If there are known problems with older versions that get in the way, I
> > > > agree.  Are there?  
> 
> > > Are there?  
> 
> > That's what I asked.  Do you know the answer?
> 
> Don't you understand? How could I possibly answer that quiz, since it's been 4 years
> I use 2.69? You can't tell for sure just because there has been no complain: you can
> only tell for sure if someone you 'trust' check with what ever version you'd like to
> use.

Problems in past versions of development tools are described in the
documentation, and if that's not enough, the maintainers of the tools
can be asked about them.  There should be no need to learn about that
from personal experience alone.

> Besides, 'users' who locally manually install and compile GDB probably know a lot
> more then I on the subject :)

I don't think the fact that I build my own GDB means my time is cheap
and should be disregarded.

> And I bet they all setup a specific environment for that..

Not necessarily.  E.g., I don't.

Once again, if we must use features that exist only in a newer
version, then it's a reason good enough to request users to upgrade.
But as long as no such features are required, doing this:

  AC_PREREQ(2.69)

even though an older version would do, is IMO not a good idea.

And if you still disagree, let's leave it at that.  I'm not speaking
for the Guile project, so my opinion can be easily overridden.

Thanks.