[Lazarus] Is Lazarus project in a downward spiral?

[Hans-Peter Diettrich]

Vincent Snijders schrieb:

>>> It's almost impossible to replace an
>>> inappropriate implementation by a better model, because some existing 
>>> code
>>> *could* be broken by such an change - unless such a suggestion comes 
>>> from a
>>> core developer, who simply changes his existing code.
>>>
>>
>> I wholeheartedly agree with the above -- a purely theoretical
>> backwards incompatibility
>> issue already prevented me from contributing to at least one Lazarus 
>> subsystem.
>>
> 
> I wonder how such wishes can be reconciled with wishes from Tom Lisjac 
> for example to have more stable lazarus, not changing compatibility 
> every release (if that is what actually happens).

The LCL could be simplified (and stabilized) in some areas. This could 
be done by removing unused or unusable parts, or by delegating other 
tasks to new classes. The scope of such refactoring varies, from almost 
local (docking) to an entire class tree (components, IDE interfaces). 
The latter changes are almost impossible, since just a proof of concept 
would require assistance by other developers, who had to implement the 
required changes in their area (e.g. components or widgetsets). Chances 
are very low that this ever will happen :-(

DoDi