Re: API Change - tidyReleaseDate()

On 10/02/2015, at 3:13 pm, Jim Derry <[email protected]> wrote:

> Cross-posted to
>  [1]: https://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-htacg/
>  [2]: https://sourceforge.net/p/tidy/mailman/tidy-develop
>  [3]: https://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/html-tidy/
>=20
> Good day all,
>=20
> This is a request for comments about the treatment of =
`tidyReleaseDate()`.
>=20
> HTACG' current proposal and working branch currently is working on the =
assumption that we will move to a semantic versioning system as a =
replacement for a date-based version system.

There is nothing about a semantic versioning system that forbids you=20
offering timestamps *as well*.  Release dates and versions are quite
different, indeed, nearly independent things.  (A patched release of an
old version can be released after a new version.)

Suppose a program (I have a particular one in mind) tells you that it
is version 5.9.124867.  What does that actually signify?  Is that a =
recent
version or an obsolete version?  But when it tells me it was released on
2010/08/11 then I *know* that it is an old version *without having to =
check
some web site to see what the latest version is*.

> This has been implemented on the working branch using =
`tidyLibraryVersion()` in the API. Our goal is the first 5.0.0-rc.1 by =
February's end.
>=20
> While we will deprecate `tidyReleaseDate()`

Why?  And why should it be untrustworthy?

If I want to answer the question "How likely is it that this version of =
Tidy might
need updating", a release date is a better clue than a version number.
Especially when your build tools should give you accurate release dates =
for free!

One thing I will say is that wrong answers are, as a rule, WORSE than no =
answers.