Come on people -- has anyone who's complaining about upgrading a module ever actually upgraded a module from one version to another? It's really not that hard -- especially with coder / deadwood. I upgraded a couple modules from Drupal 5 to 6 in only a couple of hours including testing. Deadwood automates most of the process. And to kill yet again the myth that keeps coming up again and again zombie-like -- the reason so many modules had trouble upgrading from 5 to 6 is because they were dependent on Views which took so long to upgrade not because of API changes but because it was completely rewritten over the transition. Kyle Research Assistant eBusiness Center @ BYU kyle.mathews2000.com/blog On Wed, Mar 4, 2009 at 6:06 PM, Khalid Baheyeldin <kb@2bits.com> wrote:
Pretty much, yes. A full compatibility layer would like affect performance big time and a less intrusive version is probably not worth anybody's time to write.
But D7 not will be a less intrusive version, this is the point.
"less intrusive version" was referring to the compatibility layer, not Drupal.
Basically, we've had similar discussions for Drupal 4.7, 5, and 6 and all were hailed as the end of Drupal as we know it because nobody would be able to update their modules in time, etc yadayada. We probably have had this discussions for even earlier versions but luckily I've managed to forget them.
Executive summary: Compatibility layer == bad.
I agree, but it's bat too rewrite from scratch every time a lot of code, like Views or CCK or Panels.
Could be nicer have at least a stable API or a *drupalX-compat" plugin with older API, but bright people surely know this things better of me :)
So far, it has proven to be an acceptable price to pay for innovation. Yes, it causes some pain, but if we fix the APIs between major releases, this will be the start of the end for Drupal, since it will either get bloated by a compatibility layer (more resources, slow, complexity, ...etc.), or Drupal will stagnate and no longer become a leading content management platform/application.
Having said that, there is nothing stopping YOU (or others) from building a compatibility layers. Some people tried that from Drupal 4.6 to 4.7 after Form API was in core. We just don't want that to be in core.
Better focus on tools that would make migrating your modules easier/quicker (core, deadwood, documentation for converting from 6.x to 7.x, ...etc.)
P.
-- Paolo Mainardi
Vice Presidente Assoc.ILDN (http://www.ildn.net) Blog: http://www.paolomainardi.com
-- Khalid M. Baheyeldin 2bits.com, Inc. http://2bits.com Drupal optimization, development, customization and consulting. Simplicity is prerequisite for reliability. -- Edsger W.Dijkstra Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication. -- Leonardo da Vinci