[pulseaudio-discuss] [PATCH] Don't let user-set PULSE_RUNTIME_PATH values affect behaviour

[Glenn Golden]

David Henningsson <david.henningsson at canonical.com> [2014-10-02 11:29:50 +0200]:
> 
> 
> On 2014-10-02 11:17, Tanu Kaskinen wrote:
> >On Mon, 2014-09-29 at 13:50 +0200, David Henningsson wrote:
> >>
> >>On 2014-09-28 11:23, Tanu Kaskinen wrote:
> >>>The logic for choosing the runtime directory is complicated enough
> >>>also without adding PULSE_RUNTIME_PATH into the mix. XDG_RUNTIME_DIR
> >>>is sufficient for users to control the runtime directory.
> >>>PULSE_RUNTIME_PATH has not been documented, so this change doesn't
> >>>constitute an interface break.
> >>
> >>A quick googling of PULSE_RUNTIME_PATH seems to indicate usage of this
> >>environment variable in at least chromium and enlightenment, and also
> >>recommended in several blog posts and mailing lists, including this one.
> >>It is likely used in several home-made scripts.
> >>
> >>I'm hesitant to remove it for that reason.
> >
> >The argument that "if you use undocumented interfaces, you can only
> >blame yourself if your script breaks" probably won't change your mind,
> >so I guess we'll just have to make this a documented interface then.
> 
> Well, while not officially documented, we have still advocated the use of it
> on this mailing list [1], which to some degree could be seen as the de-facto
> documentation of PULSE_RUNTIME_PATH, given the lack of official
> documentation saying otherwise.
> 

2c suggestion from the albatross-avoidance dept: How about adding it to the
official doc, but as an explcitly deprecated feature (and with an explicit
associated date/version beyond which it will not be supported)?