Erik Moeller wrote:
What would be the disadvantage of having a single
"I'd like the latest
and greatest changes once they come in" preference for our users? The
main disadvantage I see is that we'd need to temporarily retain two
codepaths for significant user-facing changes, potentially increasing
code complexity a fair bit, but perhaps reducing post-launch cost in
return.
It would increase code complexity a lot, and it would make debugging
more difficult. Don't forget that the desktop execution environment
(front & back) is much more heterogenous -- you have gadgets,
substantial interface customization via the MediaWiki NS, multiple
skins, legacy interfaces, and a much wider set of extensions, all of
which conspire to make bugs much harder to reproduce. I'm inclined to
think that we already get most of the benefits this approach purports to
confer from the general MediaWiki release cycle.