Re: Discussion about why GNU/Linux system upgrades cause old programs to break

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  > >
  > > Even if we agree that that particular deviation had become a bad idea
  > > to use, reporting it as an error and making compilation fail is harsh,
  > > and causes trouble for the users of GCC.

  > For this particular deviation, not reporting it as an error or not
  > making compilation fail also causes trouble for the users of GCC.

Are you and I talking about the same set of cases?

Are you saying it causes trouble _for some programs on some possible
platforms_, or _that it causes trouble for all such programs on
whichever platform that user uses_?

  > The users have already changed that code.  The vast, vast, majority of
  > cases where these diagnostics are emitted are not intentional uses but,
  > rather, indicative of a bug.

I think it would be useful to clarify what "bug" means in that statement.

Does it mean, "on some possible standard-conforming platform, the
program would execute wrong"?

Does it mean, "the program will execute wrong on a platform that
user will use in the next year or next decade"?



-- 
Dr Richard Stallman (https://stallman.org)
Chief GNUisance of the GNU Project (https://gnu.org)
Founder, Free Software Foundation (https://fsf.org)
Internet Hall-of-Famer (https://internethalloffame.org)