[pkg-boost-devel] Boost Transitions; deprecating 1.35

[Steve M. Robbins]

Hello,

This email is addressed to maintainers of packages that build-depend
on Boost 1.35; i.e. libboost1.35-dev, and similar.  I've included the
output of 'dd-list'[2] for your convenience.

Boost 1.35 is deprecated and slated for removal [Bug#508237].  Now
that Lenny is released, we'll be going ahead with the removal.  When
that happens, please build-depend on libboost1.38-dev (and siblings),
which will be uploaded very shortly.

Note that Boost 1.38 is not yet uploaded but I hope to do so in the
next day or two.  That means you won't see it for some time, as it
must pass through the NEW queue.  In the meanwhile, you can use the
existing Boost 1.37 packages to investigate what the transition means
for your code.


The Details
-----------

The same -dev package names have been used for Boost versions 1.21
through 1.34.1.  Each time a new Boost upstream was released, all the
build-depending packages needed to be recompiled.  Often, several
packages needed source tweaks due to Boost API changes.  Boost is not
able to maintain a stable API across each and every Boost library [1].
Since Boost is used in several widely-used libraries and frameworks
(e.g. some of kde), the resulting transition entangled a large number
of packages and became too painful.

As a result, starting with Boost 1.35: each Boost release is packaged
in its own set of -dev packages, e.g. libboost1.37-dev,
libboost-regex1.37-dev.  This allows each of the build-depending
package to transition at their own schedule.  Hopefully, the
transition is as easy as changing the Build-Depends line and
recompiling.

Although the parallel -dev packages serve to reduce the pain caused by
each new Boost version, an explosion of boost versions is also
difficult to manage.  The Debian boost maintainers would like to keep
a maximum of two boost versions at any one time.  This desire is
tempered by the fact that in the past year, Boost moved to quarterly
releases.  Such a pace requires that everyone update their boost
build-depends line at least twice a year.  I hope this is viewed
as a reasonable compromise.  Your thoughts on the matter are
appreciated.

Thanks,
-Steve (for the Debian Boost maintainer team)


[1] This has been debated widely on the Boost lists and elsewhere.
See, e.g. http://lists.boost.org/Archives/boost/2008/03/135212.php for
practical experience in API changes.  There was a recent thread -- see
http://lists.boost.org/Archives/boost/2009/01/147260.php -- about the
monolithic nature of Boost.  Neither has been resolved, so we feel
that the current practice is the best compromise between keeping Boost
current in Debian without too many entangling transitions.


[2] Maintainer addresses of affected packages:

Masayuki Hatta (mhatta) <mhatta at debian.org>
   abiword

Debian Scientific Computing Team <pkg-scicomp-devel at lists.alioth.debian.org>
   framewave
   openturns

Albert Huang <albert at csail.mit.edu>
   framewave (U)

Joshua Kwan <joshk at triplehelix.org>
   abiword (U)

Christophe Prud'homme <prudhomm at debian.org>
   framewave (U)
   openturns (U)

Pau Garcia i Quiles <pgquiles at elpauer.org>
   witty

Simon Richter <sjr at debian.org>
   asio
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