David Metzler schrieb:
> Yep, I agree that this is problematic for dropping support for PHP 4.  I
> think that this is not likely to change until there's wider adoption for
> php 5 by the vendors who bundle LAMP with operating systems.  Redhat ES
> 4 and Mac OSX still default ship with php 4 as the default install.  My
> personal preference would be to hold off requiring PHP5, assuming our
> goal is to make drupal available to the masses :).

As you all should have noticed, Karoly mentioned to drop PHP4 support
for Drupal 7. Drupal 7 will be released at some time next(!) year.

The correct time to evaluate his proposition is therefore the time when
development of Drupal 7 starts, which will be after the release of
Drupal 6 later this year.

Well said.

By that time, several Linux distributions will have released new
versions and the availability of PHP5 might have increased widely.

Some distros already include it. For example, on Ubuntu 6.10 (release
last October) has 5.1.6, as well as the option to install 4 if you want to.

One issue is that some providers still use Fedora Core 4, or older versions
of CentOS. I see these all the time and it makes my life harder.

Another issue may be that some popular packages (e.g. forum software,
...etc.) would not work well with PHP5, and hence hosting companies
are conservative in upgrading to PHP5.

Let's look at this again in summer then and concentrate on the
development of the current Drupal version.

Agreed. I hope the landscape changes in favor of PHP5, but I am not
holding my breath.