[Interest] Qt Versioning Questions

[Jason H]

> Sent: Wednesday, September 14, 2016 at 11:05 AM
> From: "Kai Koehne" <Kai.Koehne at qt.io>
> To: "Jason H" <jhihn at gmx.com>, "Interests Qt" <interest at qt-project.org>
> Subject: RE: [Interest] Qt Versioning Questions
>
> 
> 
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Interest [mailto:interest-bounces+kai.koehne=qt.io at qt-project.org]
> > On Behalf Of Jason H
> > Sent: Wednesday, September 14, 2016 4:53 PM
> > To: Interests Qt <interest at qt-project.org>
> > Subject: [Interest] Qt Versioning Questions
> > 
> > So Qt has 3 codelines being maintained (AFAIK): 5.6 (LTS), 5.7, 5.8
> > 
> > I need fixes that are in 5.6.2. First question: When will those fixes from 5.6.2
> > be available in 5.7 and 5.8? Given the timing it looks like 5.6.2->5.7.1-5.8?
> 
> This is correct.
> 
> > Also I am waiting for https://bugreports.qt.io/browse/QTBUG-51133 to land
> > in some version which will be my next used Qt version after 5.6.2. The
> > change for 51133 is exposing "scaledFontSize" in the QML Text element. I
> > understand this is an "API" change and can only be delivered in 5.8, though I
> > don't think it would break binary compatibility? Is that correct?
> 
> Binary compatibility is indeed less of a concern, since this is for a QML element.
> However, new properties should only appear in a new import, because otherwise
> bindings for existing applications might change unexpectedly. Introducing new
> properties in a patch level release would also break the promise that an app 
> compiled against 5.6.2 can still run with 5.6.0. To cite the ChangeLog for 5.6.1:
> 
>   Qt 5.6.1 is a bug-fix release. It maintains both forward and backward
>   compatibility (source and binary) with Qt 5.6.0.
> 
> > I also
> > understand that 5.8 is approaching freeze, so will this land in 5.8 or will I have
> > to wait another year to see it in 5.9? Given the amount of awesome going
> > into 5.8, I'd like to see it there as I don't have anything in 5.7 of interest and
> > I'd not like to wait a year to get this (I'd actually love to see it arrive in the 5.6
> > line)
> 
> 5.8 is already in feature freeze, so I'm afraid this has to wait for 5.9. But 5.9 will 
> hopefully not take a year, current plan says April 2017. 


Thanks for the insight. If it says April, well... the 5.7 FF was in February, and it was released in June. So 5.8 FF is now, release 5.8 in January (realistically), Announce 5.9 FF, release ~6 months later puts it in June... I think realistically we are looking at August 2017 since most Qt releases slip 2 months from the original plan, which is why I said a year from now*. (But I'd love to be wrong.)

*Wild speculation since https://wiki.qt.io/Qt_5.9_Release doesn't exist yet. ;-)