[Info-vax] Python 2 support ends 1-Jan-2020

[Stephen Hoffman]

On 2019-01-04 16:05:50 +0000, Dave Froble said:

> Not everyone has the same perceptions of reality ....
> 
> Now, I know nothing of Python.  But the little I "think" I understand, 
> from reading here in c.o.v, is that some people who are working on 
> Python 3 have a vision that is incompatible with older versions of 
> Python.  Is that a fair assessment?

Ponder whether fixing stuff is utterly impossible with OpenVMS, for 
those cases that cannot be fixed compatibly.

The password hash length being a salient example.

All decisions and all designs and all limitations must absolutely be 
preserved forever, for always, and must never be changed.

Training customers to expect wholesale upward compatibility was one of 
the dumbest ideas DEC ever had, BTW.  Mostly compatible, sure.  
Entirely compatible?  That's a whole bucket of nope.

> If so, then this might be a fair test of the acceptance, and therefore 
> viability, of visionaries attempting to drag others along into their 
> vision.  Regardless of the merits of the vision, remember the classic 
> case of VCR and Batamax.

Betamax was purportedly a better format and was more expensive, and got 
undercut in the market.  Cheaper and good-enough, versus more expensive 
and less-than-clearly-differentiated.

Itanium and x86-64 would be a closer and more familiar example.

> Similar to the advocates of OO.  The vision of some just may not be 
> adopted be others.

Have you tried OOP, David?   Blows the sneakers off itemlists, in terms 
of its support for upward-compatibility.

And yes, OOP and FP won't be adopted by everybody.  No scheme ever is.

No more than everybody will move off of PDP-11 or VAX hardware or emulation.

There will always be oddities and corners in the market.

VSI exists in one of those corners now, and the question is whether 
they can expand out of their current corner.

Change is the only way.

> Perhaps sometimes the visionaries will not be followed.  Perhaps 
> sometimes they should not be followed.

There are many reasons not to do something.  Not changing is safe.  Not 
changing is comfortable.  Familiar.  Not changing is cheap.  Until it's 
not.

The one thing I'm absolutely certain of here?

OpenVMS will continue on its current path if VSI doesn't start dragging 
it forward, and that some of that dragging-forward will necessarily 
involve breaking existing APIs.

The x86-64 port is just a very small part of what's necessary here, if 
the goal is to extend OpenVMS past what solely interests the installed 
base.



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