deprecation issues

Some comments on the DEPRECATION issues (33, 40, 99)...

33 -- agree.  Change "should not be used" to something like "should be 
avoided by producers" (or "authors", or "generators", or find some other 
suitable word).

40 -- the first sentence of GL7 is "A deprecated feature is an existing 
feature that has been outdated by newer constructs or is no longer 
viable."   I think it is our intention that this encompass "obsolete".  So 
I propose that we agree with this comment, it was our intention all along 
that deprecated features include obsolete features, and that we will 
clarify this editorially.

99 -- I think that the commenter has misunderstood our intent in CP7.3 (and 
therefore some editorial clarification is probably in order), which 
reads:  "If deprecation is used, define its relationships and interaction 
with other dimensions of variability."  I think that CP7.3 requires that 
the spec define the relationship of the deprecation DoV itself (if there 
are deprecated features in the spec) to the other DoV.  Commenter is 
assuming that "defines" means fully defining the deprecated feature, which 
may indeed be problematic.  But, even if a feature has been deprecated 
because it is basically poorly defined or undefinable, it is still possible 
(in fact desirable) for the spec to address how the deprecation of the 
feature is related to, e.g., module definitions, discretionary features, etc.

-Lofton.

Received on Thursday, 10 April 2003 10:42:45 UTC