Smalltalk version

Roel Wuyts Roel.Wuyts at ulb.ac.be
Mon Apr 10 15:44:02 UTC 2006


I propose to remove the backwardCompatibility, since in this case it  
is one of the few methods that are actually the same across Smalltalk  
dialects by convention (and not by chance or evolution).


On 08 Apr 2006, at 21:44, stéphane ducasse wrote:

> Roel
>
> I just checked and
>
> version
> 	"Answer the version of this release."
>
> 	self backwardCompatibilityOnly: 'Use SystemVersion current version'.
> 	^SystemVersion current version
>
> Is there. So you can avoid the pop up by turning the preferences  
> for not getting the warning.
> We could remove the backwardCompatibility.
> Stef
>
> On 6 avr. 06, at 15:07, Roel Wuyts wrote:
>
>> Hello,
>>
>> long time no see :-)  I'm doing things in Squeak again, so I'll  
>> try to follow the list once more...
>>
>> One of the first things I want to mention is the demise of the  
>> method 'version' on Smalltalk. It was actually decided at some  
>> point in time by Smalltalk environments to implement this method  
>> to return some description of the environment (the format of the  
>> version string was not standardized; go figure). This method  
>> exists in nearly all Smalltalk environments and makes it easy to  
>> write generic Smalltalk code with some environment-specific  
>> extensions for which one wants to check.
>>
>> I use this, for example in RoelTyper, to check some Squeak or VW  
>> specific things. But now this method is deprecated, and instead of  
>> being able to do:
>> 	Smalltalk version
>> I would now have to do:
>> 	SystemVersion current version
>>
>> The problem is that the first expressions works in nearly any  
>> Smalltalk environment, while the second one works only in Squeak,  
>> which defeats the whole purpose of this method! So I will have to  
>> write the following:
>>
>> 	^(Smalltalk at: #SystemVersion ifAbsent: [^Smalltalk version])  
>> current version
>>
>> My proposal: please do not deprecate the 'version' method on  
>> Smalltalk, but implement it as:
>>
>> version
>>
>> 	SystemVersion current version
>>
>>
>> Any opinions ?
>>
>> --
>> Roel
>>
>
>




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