[swift-evolution] Seriously! Freeze Swift For Two Years After Release 3.0 !

[Jean-Denis Muys]

Ted,

I basically disagree 100% with everything you wrote. I will not got into much details, but for me, technology that doesn’t evolve is dead technology.

Moreover, your main argument about large code bases, is not a good one: we now have migration tools that work quite well. They could be made even better, with some investment, that most (I think) would rather see invested in the leading edge.

Aversion to change is everywhere. It’s deeply engrained in us human beings. That’s why consultant make a living selling change management. I have seen people complain a lot about Apple releasing new versions of iOS for example. I have seen developers complain that Apple releases new versions of Xcode too frequently. I was even not too long ago in a position to do a web development job for a customer who wanted to support Internet Explorer 6. I have very little sympathy for such plights.

If you don’t want to maintain your Swift 2 code, don’t. But don’t prevent the rest of us from doing it, despite the efforts required.

I applaud the way the Swift team is handling those breaking changes, piling them up as early as possible, postponing additive changes to post 3.0. This is the way to minimise the efforts as much as possible. I hope that even then, source-breaking changes will continue to happen when they make sense. I am looking forward to a language that will get constantly better at enabling me to evolve my code in the most productive way. If my source code breaks, that is a very small price to pay.

Jean-Denis