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Is it really a breaking change if a method changes output after an update? (lemmy.world)
submitted 1 year ago by asdfasdfasdf@lemmy.world to c/programming@programming.dev
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This might seem obviously "yes" at first, but consider a method like foo.debugRepr() which outputs the string FOO and has documentation which says it is meant only to be used for logging / debugging. Then you make a new release of your library and want to update the debug representation to be **FOO**.

Based on the semantics of debugRepr() I would argue that this is NOT a breaking change even though it is returning a different value, because it should only affect logging. However, if someone relies on this and uses it the wrong way, it will break their code.

What do you think? Is this a breaking change or not?

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[-] fubo@lemmy.world 14 points 1 year ago

Edge case: If you call foo.version() and it returns a different string in version 1.02 than in version 1.01, that is not a defect.

[-] falsem@kbin.social 13 points 1 year ago

That's not a functionality change. The method still does the same thing: "outputs the current version of the software".

[-] asdfasdfasdf@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago

I think that's what they're saying.

[-] asdfasdfasdf@lemmy.world 1 points 1 year ago

Very interesting. Good point!

this post was submitted on 07 Sep 2023
61 points (96.9% liked)

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