Heads up: planned removal of String instances from HTTP package

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Ganesh Sittampalam

29 Jan 2013 29 Jan '13

5:15 p.m.

Hi, tl;dr: I'm planning on removing the String instances from the HTTP package. This is likely to break code. Obviously it will involve a major version bump. The basic reason is that this instance is rather broken in itself. A String ought to represent Unicode data, but the HTTP wire format is bytes, and HTTP makes no attempt to handle encoding. This was discussed on the libraries@ list a while back, but I'm happy to discuss further if there's a general feeling that this is a bad thing to do: http://www.haskell.org/pipermail/libraries/2012-September/018426.html I will probably upload the new version in a week or two. Cheers, Ganesh

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Johan Tibell

29 Jan 29 Jan

5:46 p.m.

New subject: Heads up: planned removal of String instances from HTTP package

On Tue, Jan 29, 2013 at 2:15 PM, Ganesh Sittampalam wrote:

...

tl;dr: I'm planning on removing the String instances from the HTTP package. This is likely to break code. Obviously it will involve a major version bump.

The basic reason is that this instance is rather broken in itself. A String ought to represent Unicode data, but the HTTP wire format is bytes, and HTTP makes no attempt to handle encoding.

This was discussed on the libraries@ list a while back, but I'm happy to discuss further if there's a general feeling that this is a bad thing to do:

http://www.haskell.org/pipermail/libraries/2012-September/018426.html

I will probably upload the new version in a week or two.

I think it's the right thing to do. Providing a little upgrade guide should help things to go smoother.

Ganesh Sittampalam

30 Jan 30 Jan

2 a.m.

New subject: Heads up: planned removal of String instances from HTTP package

On 29/01/2013 22:46, Johan Tibell wrote:

...

On Tue, Jan 29, 2013 at 2:15 PM, Ganesh Sittampalam wrote:

...
tl;dr: I'm planning on removing the String instances from the HTTP package. This is likely to break code. Obviously it will involve a major version bump.

I think it's the right thing to do. Providing a little upgrade guide should help things to go smoother.

One obvious cheap-and-dirty migration is via a newtype wrapper for String that embeds the old broken behaviour (char8 encoding). Perhaps the package should provide that? (with appropriate warnings etc) Ganesh

Alfredo Di Napoli

3:01 a.m.

New subject: Heads up: planned removal of String instances from HTTP package

Maybe (just my 2 cents!) since you are going to broke the API anyway, go for it and seize the occasion to really clean up :) Obviously I'm saying this from a non-http-user point of view, maybe if I had some code in production affected by this, my suggestion would have been different :P Regards, A. On 30 January 2013 07:00, Ganesh Sittampalam wrote:

...

On 29/01/2013 22:46, Johan Tibell wrote:

...
On Tue, Jan 29, 2013 at 2:15 PM, Ganesh Sittampalam wrote:

...
tl;dr: I'm planning on removing the String instances from the HTTP package. This is likely to break code. Obviously it will involve a major version bump.

I think it's the right thing to do. Providing a little upgrade guide should help things to go smoother.

One obvious cheap-and-dirty migration is via a newtype wrapper for String that embeds the old broken behaviour (char8 encoding). Perhaps the package should provide that? (with appropriate warnings etc)

Ganesh

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Ganesh Sittampalam

2:12 p.m.

New subject: Heads up: planned removal of String instances from HTTP package

Unfortunately I lack the time for a wholesale cleanup. If others have proposals and are willing to supply the patches that's a different matter! On 30/01/2013 08:01, Alfredo Di Napoli wrote:

...

Maybe (just my 2 cents!) since you are going to broke the API anyway, go for it and seize the occasion to really clean up :) Obviously I'm saying this from a non-http-user point of view, maybe if I had some code in production affected by this, my suggestion would have been different :P

Regards, A.

On 30 January 2013 07:00, Ganesh Sittampalam mailto:ganesh@earth.li> wrote:

On 29/01/2013 22:46, Johan Tibell wrote: > On Tue, Jan 29, 2013 at 2:15 PM, Ganesh Sittampalam mailto:ganesh@earth.li> wrote: >> tl;dr: I'm planning on removing the String instances from the HTTP >> package. This is likely to break code. Obviously it will involve a major >> version bump. > > I think it's the right thing to do. Providing a little upgrade guide > should help things to go smoother.

One obvious cheap-and-dirty migration is via a newtype wrapper for String that embeds the old broken behaviour (char8 encoding). Perhaps the package should provide that? (with appropriate warnings etc)

Ganesh

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Alfredo Di Napoli
Ganesh Sittampalam
Johan Tibell