New Xorg bad

Question

It seems new xorg 7.3 is breaking my system here and there .
1) My mouse has stopped working:http://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=39494
2) Java applications not working http://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=39523
This gives me a feeling that archlinux is sacrificing quality in the name of bleeding edge.:(

Answer 1

brain0 wrote:For all of us who actually used it, it was fine. So, among the Arch devs, it was common knowledge that the new version is fine.
First: thank you for your work as a developer. I really appreciate it.
Second: The only issue I have encountered thus far after the Xorg upgrade is related to JAVA apps' assertion failures, and the posted workaround seems to be a viable [shot-term] solution until the offending JAVA apps are fixed.
Now, to the meat: your post says that the new version of Xorg (and all related, updated components) is fine per testing done by those who participated in the testing phase. But the upgrade has obviously created an array of issues, even if the issues are not all direct bugs of Xorg (i.e., they may be issues with applications that use Xorg ... though the apps worked with previous Xorg versions), or the issues may "simply" require reconfiguring xorg.conf.
So, with that in mind, do the developers have an obligation to more thoroughly document the potential issues that upgrading may cause? Or is it simply a matter of adopting the philosophy that issues not classified as technically "bugs", even though they may adversely impact users, do not warrant reporting?
These questions are especially relevant when the issues affect such basic PC operations as JAVA applications, video display and input device functionality, all of which must have been encountered and noted during testing. The Arch News bulletin certainly fell short of this reporting:
http://www.archlinux.org/news/363/
X.org 7.3 hits [extra]
After a testing period for over one month we made the decision to move X.org 7.3 to our stable package repositories. Thanks to all the testers and reporters who enabled us to wipe out most of the major issues.
Please note that libgl-dri has been renamed to libgl since the deprecation of libgl-mesa happened a long time ago already. That means people packaging for the AUR should finally get rid of any hard dependencies on libgl-dri or else their packages will be left broken.
That certainly paints a rosier picture than what users encountered after the upgrade. I don't see "beware, lots of JAVA apps will break" or "you may have to learn to configure xorg.conf all over again" in that news release.
So, I'm just curious what your take is on providing a little more information when these big-package upgrades are pushed out so that users can make informed decisions about how to proceed (of course, making backups first is always good ... which I did).
Thanks.