Request to bump Qt version requirements to 4.6.3 for KDE SC 4.5 (and above)

[Maciej Mrozowski]

On Thursday 08 of July 2010 19:28:01 Thiago Macieira wrote:
> On Thursday 8. July 2010 18.42.36 Maciej Mrozowski wrote:
> > The question is: who cares whether Qt minor releases are interchangeable
> > or  not so that we can just specify minimal required dependencies to
> > ensure only that stuff compiles?
> > 
> > "the build-time dependency should only be a minor release of Qt " - is
> > this  policy written anywhere? Why is it more important that code
> > compiles than providing better user experience? I think it's fundamental
> > question.
> 
> The build-time requirement doesn't influence the run-time requirement of
> Qt. You can compile against 4.6.3 and then run against 4.6.0.
> 
> So requiring 4.6.3 to compile will NOT get your bug solved.

I disagree but let me explain.

Someone fetches KDE tarballs. Tries to build them - then encounters build 
error stating that Qt dependencies are not met. Person in question upgrades 
Qt, then builds KDE and problem has been solved by avoiding it.

If person in question is distro packager, he does the same, but he also 
ensures that runtime dependencies of packages he's preparing are matching 
build time dependencies. So problem has been avoided as well (note that KDE SC 
4.5.0 is not out yet and number of bug reported already is significant).

If said person purposely hacks buildsystem to allow older Qt version - he 
should be ready to grab the pieces. The only case when bug is not "solved".

> You need to convince your distro to upgrade. And all KDE has to do is to
> say that distros should upgrade.
> 
> And that should go without saying that distros should always upgrade. And
> they do.
> 
> So what are you complaining about?
> 
> Bug reported -> ceck
> Bug fixed -> check
> Distros upgrading -> check

Right. But those users who will go through this exact same procedure over and 
over AGAIN. Because:
- they weren't told Qt-4.6.2 is broken in this regard (why would they? they 
just grab packages and build from source against whatever Qt version they 
happen to have)
or
- packager who prepared packages for them was not told Qt-4.6.2 is broken in 
this regard.
So the only reliable way for them to find out is to personally experience bug, 
fill it (or seach bugzilla first), then be told to go away and complain 
elsewhere (usually distro).
And all of this could have been avoided if dependencies were raised in first 
place.

(and some people say it's distros that work like "it compiles -> release")

Now, it's been enough noise already so most distro packagers are probably 
aware that current Qt dependencies for 4.5 are not what's supposed to be used 
actually, but there will always be people building from source manually.

cheers

-- 
Maciej Mrozowski
Gentoo KDE release coordinator
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