Maybe a hint?

Posted Jan 23, 2026 19:32 UTC (Fri) by rgmoore (✭ supporter ✭, #75)
In reply to: Maybe a hint? by koflerdavid
Parent article: Debian discusses removing GTK 2 for forky

The design lifespan and actual lifespan frequently don't line up very well. As the saying goes, there is nothing more permanent than a temporary solution. The quick and dirty solution turns out to be good enough and is never replaced with the well defined, perfectly executed follow up. We've all seen it happen, so we shouldn't be surprised when it happens again.

I think what this actually shows is that our intuition- or my intuition, at least- about the lifecycle of dependencies is backward. My intuition is that big important projects need to focus on stable dependencies, while quick and dirty ones can use whatever is handy. In reality, big, well-maintained projects can afford to use less stable dependencies because they have the resources to deal with things changing under them. It's the quick and dirty projects that need to be built on the most stable base, because they're going to have to keep working without assistance.