Mail Archives: cygwin/2003/11/03/12:46:57
I think there is a point here, which often applies to those of us with end user clients to support.
It is the client's choice as to which version of any particular software they have installed, not ours to dictate. We might advise that they move to latest versions, but they might counter that with arguments such as waiting for bugs to be fixed and security / compatibility to be fully tested and proven before they migrate.
Some of our clients might like to keep pace with the latest developments, while others might prefer to stick with the tried and tested versions as long as possible. It's their choice. If we refuse to support anything but latest versions then we just lose out on most of our work opportunities. The fact that we have to support a software installation which contains an old version of something doesn't necessarily mean that the software is currently distributed with that same old version. It means that it is currently in use with the old version, which might have been distributed and installed some time ago.
Meanwhile, we have to support them - which often involves building a system for ourselves which mimics theirs in behaviour, and therefore in software versions too. Some can afford to go to the lengths of dedicating a machine to each build. My preference is to dedicate one hard drive or partition to each build. Anyway, the whole point is that those of us involved in third-party support often have to cope with different versions of a piece of software at the same time. There are various ways of achieving this. I just illustrated one of them.
Kevin.
-----Original Message-----
From: Christopher Faylor
[mailto:cgf-no-personal-reply-please AT cygwin DOT com]
Sent: 03 November 2003 16:38
To: cygwin AT cygwin DOT com
Subject: Re: Multiple cygwins/ Distributing cygwin apps
On Sun, Nov 02, 2003 at 06:29:17PM -0700, John Moore wrote:
>Cygwin is a great tool and it has this really neat installer so I can
>keep it up to date. But when a vendor ships a binary, that vendor must
>ship a binary Cygwin DLL, and there is no way it is going to match my
>latest version. This creates a problem.
- Please let us know the vendor who is releasing old versions of the
Cygwin DLL. I want to make sure that it complies with the GPL. If it
doesn't, our lawyers would like to talk to them.
- Newer versions of the cygwin DLL work with older applications.
- Newer versions of the cygwin DLL are better at finding other running
versions of the dll.
- Delete all but the newest version of the DLL and you are all set.
- If a vendor is releasing a product which doesn't work right because
there is a newer version of cygwin, complain to the vendor. Their
installation is busted.
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