Re: [platform-swt-dev] abi and versioning

["James E. Flemer" <jflemer@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

On 5 Mar 2003, Tom Tromey wrote:

> >>>>> "James" == James E Flemer <jflemer@xxxxxxxxxxx> writes:
>
> James> Could someone point me at where to find the libswt versioning
> James> information?  I am creating a FreeBSD port of libswt / eclipse,
> James> and need to know the versioning policy (with respect to ABI
> James> changes) so that I can make sure libswt gets installed with an
> James> appropriate major.minor.
>
> My impression is that there is a single version number that is put
> into the library's name.  For instance, in cvs we currently see
> `libswt-gtk-2131.so' and `libswt-pi-gtk-2131.so'.  This number is
> updated from time to time (presumably in response to API changes) and
> the Java code explicitly loads a library with a number in its name.

Well if that is the case, then essentially that means that
there is only a major version number for libswt.  What
happens if a bug fix is applied that does not change the
ABI (or API for that matter)?  Typically this would cause
just a minor version number to be incremented, so that
existing applications would not need relinking.  If
necessary, the FreeBSD port can start versioning libswt
independently of the eclipse project, but I'd rather not
due that because it means I would have to check each
version myself for ABI compatibility.

What relation, if any, does the directory name have to the
library version.  For example, the Linux RC1 package has:

eclipse/plugins/org.eclipse.swt.gtk_2.1.0/os/linux/x86/libswt-gtk-2130.so

The "2.1.0" refers to the Eclipse version, not the libswt
version, right?

-James