Re: gr version hell gets bigger and bigger...

[(GNU Radio maintainer)]

Hi Ralph,

thanks for reaching out!
Well, I'm coming from exactly the other side as you: GNU Radio's
version hell is finally getting reduced.

You see, we've been stuck with GNU Radio 3.7 for what feels like
forever. That meant that a lot of technically necessary stuff, like
using Python 3, because Python 2 is no longer officially supported,
couldn't be done. Also, development-wise, GNU Radio was stuck in the
early 2000's; now at least we can use C++11. It literally is not
possible to remedy that without breaking compatibility with existing
code – hence the 3.8 release.

In other words, while GNU Radio was slowly withering in 3.7 lately,
3.8, after about six years of stability and stagnation, was a change of
environment that was __impossible__ to not have.

I hence have little regrets: yes, some (many) modules have not been
ported (yet). That's too bad, but guess what: We can make zero
guarantees about GNU Radio 3.7 even being buildable on a modern OS. For
example, GNU Radio 3.7 was kicked out of debian at one point, because
the python and Qt used were no longer available in debian.

So, one version bump in six years: hardly hell, but necessary.

Consider gr-limesdr not working on GNU Radio 3.8 (I didn't even know
that): 3.8 has been announced for years, and I think Lime would
actually be the party in need of keeping up with their customers'
needs, not us. I think they might be pretty positive if you just
contact them and tell them that, hey, to use the hardware you paid for
in a wide range of applications, you'd need them to update their GNU
Radio adapter. In the end, it's in their best interest, and they'll
definitely like knowing the priorities of their customers!

Best regards,
Marcus

On Wed, 2020-01-29 at 12:44 +0100, Ralph A. Schmid, dk5ras wrote:
> Hi out there,
> 
> only a common remark :) I am using gnuradio for around six or seven
> years
> now, and such issues were always present, but I never experienced
> them in
> the extent like nowadays. 
> 
> More and more I am trapped in version conflicts. Only one simple
> example,
> for being able to use gnuradio with my gr-limesdr I need to use gr
> 3.7,
> however a LoRaWAN project I wanted to use requires gr 3.8. In other
> cases
> projects I wanted to use combined required even three different gr
> versions.
> 
> 
> As I am not a coder, no, I can't contribute and update the projects -
> I am
> only a user. And also I was not yet motivated enough modifying the
> cmake
> file to fool the procedure, in the hope, it may work somehow if I
> simply
> extend the accepted version range.
> 
> I know, this is mainly a matter of the people who maintain such
> projects...and I have no idea how the awareness for this could be
> sharpened.
> 
> 
> As a matter of fact, the most stuff I want to play with still loves
> 3.7,
> even going to 3.8 breaks way too much.
> 
> Ralph.
> 
> --
> 
> Ralph A. Schmid, dk5ras
> Mondstr. 10
> 90762 Fürth
> +49-171-3631223
> +49-911-21650056
> address@hidden
> http://www.bclog.de/
> 
> 
> 
>