HP-UX 11i September 2001 Release Notes

ManualsBrandsHP ManualsSoftwareHP-UX 11i v1.6 Technical Computing (TCOE) LTU

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Compatibility

Obsolescence and Deprecation of APIs

Chapter 12

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Obsolescence and Deprecation of APIs

This section deﬁnes the obsolescence of core system libraries and relocatable objects.

Obsolescence of other products are covered in separate sections.

Rationale and Objectives

The HP rational and objectives of obsolesence and deprecation of APIs are:

• provide common, standard APIs across UNIX vendors

• facilitate portability for our ISVs

• reduce confusion for the selection of similar APIs

• reduce the size of libc, thus increasing performance of shared libc

• reduce the continued application turbulence for future architecture changes

• remove the compatibility problems for applications which link with shared libraries

that have dependencies on archive system libraries

• reduce satisfaction issues with APIs that have speciﬁcation defects, for example,

compatibility issues

• reduce support costs for APIs that are not in the strategic direction of standards, the

industry, and our customers

• minimize adoption issues for new releases on PA or IA-64

The intent is that there will be NO gratuitous changes, and obsolescence of APIs and

libraries is acceptable when initiated to avoid application breakage or duplicate

functionality.

Terms and Deﬁnitions

Deprecated: A "deprecated" interface can have the following characteristics:

• functionality is available on the system

• deprecation is a step towards obsolescence

• the speciﬁcation is in ﬂux

• less value to users

• functionality no longer makes sense

• functionality has been replaced

• support/enhancement expectations have been lowered

• usage is discouraged

• warnings against usage/alternatives are provided

• the provider continues to test functionality

• migration plan/tools are provided

The reasons for marking an interface as "deprecated" may include:

• marked "to be withdrawn" by standards

• support is available via more standard means

• equivalent, enhanced, more reliable counterparts exist

• also all reasons listed in the "Obsolete" section below