github.com/lmorg/murex@v0.0.0-20240217211045-e081c89cd4ef/gen/root/compatibility.inc.md (about)

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     7  
     8  Murex is committed to backwards compatibility. While we do want to continue to
     9  grow and improve the shell, this will not come at the expense of long term
    10  usability. 
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    15  
    16  - [Our compatibility commitment](#our-compatibility-commitment)
    17    - [Features](#features)
    18    - [Breaking changes](#breaking-changes)
    19    - [Experimental features](#experimental-features)
    20    - [Development releases](#development-releases)
    21    - [Versioning](#versioning)
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    26  
    27  ## Our compatibility commitment
    28  
    29  You can consider Murex as stable. Many of us are using Murex as our primary
    30  shell, some for years. There is already a non-trivial amount of code written
    31  for Murex and that code will remain compatible for many years to come.
    32  
    33  The following is a breakdown of Murex's development and backwards compatibility
    34  commitment, in the hope it brings confidence to new users.
    35  
    36  ### Features
    37  
    38  Any feature in the `master` branch (ie in a stable build) and thus published on
    39  https://murex.rocks is considered stable.
    40  
    41  Stable features are seldom removed (seriously, there are still parser rules for
    42  undocumented but deprecated features from five years ago!).
    43  
    44  If a feature is to be deprecated, the following steps are followed:
    45  * first a deprecation notice is served in these docs
    46  * after the next new [major](https://semver.org/) update, a warning will then
    47    be issued with the feature itself. When that feature is invoked, the warning
    48    will give notice of the deprecation
    49  * after the following new major update, that feature will then be removed
    50  
    51  This process is expected to take around two years. You do not need to regularly
    52  follow the Github discussions to keep track of changes to the shell.
    53  
    54  Features are only likely to be deprecated if they are unpopular.
    55  
    56  ### Breaking changes
    57  
    58  A **breaking change** is considered to be any change that could affect any
    59  Murex shell script already written.
    60  
    61  Breaking changes _might_ happen outside of the feature deprecation life cycle
    62  (described above) if:
    63  * it is adding a new syntax rather than deprecating something (such as a new
    64    operator)
    65  * and the breakages are edge cases as opposed to common (eg a bareword string
    66    that solely consists of the new operator is now parsed as an operator rather
    67    than a string)
    68  
    69  Breaking changes will be published in the [changelog](https://murex.rocks/changelog).
    70  
    71  ### Experimental features
    72  
    73  Any feature marked as **EXPERIMENTAL** is subject to change at short notice.
    74  Very few features end up as experimental and those that do might be because
    75  they either introduce weird syntax that needs using in real situations to
    76  determine their value, or might have some unresolved bugs and/or edge cases
    77  that harm the overall UX. Generally features do not remain experimental for
    78  long.
    79  
    80  ### Development releases
    81  
    82  The `develop` branch is considered unstable. It is a place for contributors to
    83  write and test code. This means all new features added to `develop` that hasn't
    84  yet been released to `master` is considered experimental.
    85  
    86  ### Versioning
    87  
    88  Murex releases roughly follows [semantic versioning](https://semver.org/).