From: "Patrick Steinhardt via GitGitGadget" <gitgitgadget@gmail•com>
To: git@vger•kernel.org
Cc: Ezekiel Newren <ezekielnewren@gmail•com>, Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks•im>
Subject: [PATCH v2 06/18] BreakingChanges: announce Rust becoming mandatory
Date: Wed, 17 Sep 2025 01:16:26 +0000 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <8e030170ddc3e6307760fa12387b8b4310ae5e26.1758071798.git.gitgitgadget@gmail.com> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <pull.2043.v2.git.git.1758071798.gitgitgadget@gmail.com>
From: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks•im>
Over the last couple of years the appetite for bringing Rust into the
codebase has grown significantly across the developer base. Introducing
Rust is a major change though and has ramifications for the whole
ecosystem:
- Some platforms have a Rust toolchain available, but have not yet
integrated it into their build infrastructure.
- Some platforms don't have any support for Rust at all.
- Some platforms may have to figure out how to fit Rust into their
bootstrapping sequence.
Due to this, and given that Git is a critical piece of infrastructure
for the whole industry, we cannot just introduce such a heavyweight
dependency without doing our due diligence.
Instead, preceding commits have introduced a test balloon into our build
infrastructure that convert one tiny subsystem to use Rust. For now,
using Rust to build that subsystem is entirely optional -- if no Rust
support is available, we continue to use the C implementation. This test
balloon has the intention to give distributions time and let them ease
into our adoption of Rust.
Having multiple implementations of the same subsystem is not sustainable
though, and the plan is to eventually be able to use Rust freely all
across our codebase. As such, there is the intent to make Rust become a
mandatory part of our build process.
Add an announcement to our breaking changes that Rust will become
mandatory in Git 3.0. A (very careful and non-binding) estimate might be
that this major release might be released in the second half of next
year, which should give distributors enough time to prepare for the
change.
Signed-off-by: Patrick Steinhardt <ps@pks•im>
Signed-off-by: Ezekiel Newren <ezekielnewren@gmail•com>
---
Documentation/BreakingChanges.adoc | 35 ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
1 file changed, 35 insertions(+)
diff --git a/Documentation/BreakingChanges.adoc b/Documentation/BreakingChanges.adoc
index f8d2eba061..56bbd5699e 100644
--- a/Documentation/BreakingChanges.adoc
+++ b/Documentation/BreakingChanges.adoc
@@ -165,6 +165,41 @@ A prerequisite for this change is that the ecosystem is ready to support the
"reftable" format. Most importantly, alternative implementations of Git like
JGit, libgit2 and Gitoxide need to support it.
+* Git will require Rust as a mandatory part of the build process. While Git
+ already started to adopt Rust in Git 2.49, all parts written in Rust are
+ optional for the time being. This includes:
++
+ ** Subsystems that have an alternative implementation in Rust to test
+ interoperability between our C and Rust codebase.
+ ** Newly written features that are not mission critical for a fully functional
+ Git client.
++
+These changes are meant as test balloons to allow distributors of Git to prepare
+for Rust becoming a mandatory part of the build process. There will be multiple
+milestones for the introduction of Rust:
++
+--
+1. In Git 2.52, both build systems will default-enable support for Rust.
+ Consequently, builds will break by default if Rust is not available on the
+ build host. The use of Rust can still be explicitly disabled via build
+ flags.
+2. In Git 3.0, the build options will be removed and support for Rust is
+ mandatory.
+--
++
+Disable building with Rust:
+Meson: `meson configure -Dwith_rust=false`.
+Makefile: `make WITH_RUST=false`,
++
+The Git project will declare the last version before Git 3.0 to be a long-term
+support release. This long-term release will receive important bug fixes for at
+least four release cycles and security fixes for six release cycles. The Git
+project will hand over maintainership of the long-term release to distributors
+in case they need to extend the life of that long-term release even further. In
+that case, the backporting process will be handled by these distributors, but
+the backported patches will be reviewed on the mailing list and pulled in by the
+Git maintainer.
+
=== Removals
* Support for grafting commits has long been superseded by git-replace(1).
--
gitgitgadget
next prev parent reply other threads:[~2025-09-17 1:16 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 100+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2025-08-29 19:42 [PATCH 00/15] Introduce rust: In xdiff Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-08-29 19:42 ` [PATCH 01/15] doc: add a policy for using Rust brian m. carlson via GitGitGadget
2025-08-29 20:00 ` brian m. carlson
2025-08-29 20:11 ` Ezekiel Newren
2025-09-02 16:39 ` brian m. carlson
2025-09-02 18:39 ` Ezekiel Newren
2025-09-04 22:55 ` Ezekiel Newren
2025-08-29 19:42 ` [PATCH 02/15] xdiff: introduce rust Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-08-29 19:42 ` [PATCH 03/15] github workflows: install rust Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-08-29 19:42 ` [PATCH 04/15] win+Meson: do allow linking with the Rust-built xdiff Johannes Schindelin via GitGitGadget
2025-08-29 19:42 ` [PATCH 05/15] github workflows: upload Cargo.lock Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-08-29 19:42 ` [PATCH 06/15] ivec: create a vector type that is interoperable between C and Rust Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-08-29 19:42 ` [PATCH 07/15] xdiff/xprepare: remove superfluous forward declarations Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-08-29 19:42 ` [PATCH 08/15] xdiff: delete unnecessary fields from xrecord_t and xdfile_t Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-08-29 19:42 ` [PATCH 09/15] xdiff: make fields of xrecord_t Rust friendly Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-08-29 19:42 ` [PATCH 10/15] xdiff: use one definition for freeing xdfile_t Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-08-29 19:42 ` [PATCH 11/15] xdiff: replace chastore with an ivec in xdfile_t Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-08-29 19:42 ` [PATCH 12/15] xdiff: delete nrec field from xdfile_t Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-08-29 19:42 ` [PATCH 13/15] xdiff: delete recs " Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-08-29 19:42 ` [PATCH 14/15] xdiff: make xdfile_t more rust friendly Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-08-29 19:42 ` [PATCH 15/15] xdiff: implement xdl_trim_ends() in Rust Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-09-17 1:16 ` [PATCH v2 00/18] Introduce rust: In xdiff Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-09-17 1:16 ` [PATCH v2 01/18] cleanup: rename variables that collide with Rust primitive type names Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-09-17 7:42 ` Eric Sunshine
2025-09-17 14:32 ` Junio C Hamano
2025-09-19 19:36 ` Ezekiel Newren
2025-09-17 1:16 ` [PATCH v2 02/18] make: add -fPIE flag Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-09-17 7:44 ` Eric Sunshine
2025-09-19 19:48 ` Ezekiel Newren
2025-09-19 20:07 ` Junio C Hamano
2025-09-19 21:52 ` Ezekiel Newren
2025-09-19 23:43 ` Junio C Hamano
2025-09-19 23:59 ` Collin Funk
2025-09-20 16:44 ` Junio C Hamano
2025-09-21 1:14 ` Ramsay Jones
2025-09-17 1:16 ` [PATCH v2 03/18] make: merge xdiff lib into libgit.a Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-09-17 7:46 ` Eric Sunshine
2025-09-19 19:54 ` Ezekiel Newren
2025-09-17 1:16 ` [PATCH v2 04/18] make: merge reftable " Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-09-17 7:46 ` Eric Sunshine
2025-09-19 19:02 ` Junio C Hamano
2025-09-19 20:00 ` Ezekiel Newren
2025-09-19 20:14 ` Junio C Hamano
2025-09-19 23:02 ` Ezekiel Newren
2025-09-17 1:16 ` [PATCH v2 05/18] doc: add a policy for using Rust brian m. carlson via GitGitGadget
2025-09-17 1:16 ` Patrick Steinhardt via GitGitGadget [this message]
2025-09-17 1:16 ` [PATCH v2 07/18] build: introduce rust Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-09-17 8:26 ` Eric Sunshine
2025-09-17 14:54 ` Junio C Hamano
2025-09-18 7:06 ` Eric Sunshine
2025-09-19 20:11 ` Ezekiel Newren
2025-09-19 20:24 ` Eric Sunshine
2025-09-19 21:28 ` Ezekiel Newren
2025-09-17 1:16 ` [PATCH v2 08/18] help: report on whether or not Rust is enabled Patrick Steinhardt via GitGitGadget
2025-09-17 1:16 ` [PATCH v2 09/18] github workflows: install rust Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-09-17 8:01 ` Eric Sunshine
2025-09-17 1:16 ` [PATCH v2 10/18] win+Meson: do allow linking with the Rust-built xdiff Johannes Schindelin via GitGitGadget
2025-09-17 1:16 ` [PATCH v2 11/18] github workflows: upload Cargo.lock Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-09-17 1:16 ` [PATCH v2 12/18] build: new crate, build-helper Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-09-17 8:58 ` Eric Sunshine
2025-09-17 1:16 ` [PATCH v2 13/18] build-helper: link against libgit.a and any other required C libraries Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-09-17 8:51 ` Eric Sunshine
2025-09-17 23:07 ` D. Ben Knoble
2025-09-17 23:31 ` Eric Sunshine
2025-09-19 20:25 ` Ezekiel Newren
2025-09-17 1:16 ` [PATCH v2 14/18] build-helper: cbindgen, let crates generate a header file Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-09-17 9:08 ` Eric Sunshine
2025-09-19 20:34 ` Ezekiel Newren
2025-09-17 1:16 ` [PATCH v2 15/18] varint: use explicit width for integers Patrick Steinhardt via GitGitGadget
2025-09-17 1:16 ` [PATCH v2 16/18] build: new crate, misc Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-09-17 9:16 ` Eric Sunshine
2025-09-19 20:42 ` Ezekiel Newren
2025-09-19 20:50 ` Eric Sunshine
2025-09-19 21:54 ` Ezekiel Newren
2025-09-17 1:16 ` [PATCH v2 17/18] misc: use BuildHelper Ezekiel Newren via GitGitGadget
2025-09-17 1:16 ` [PATCH v2 18/18] misc::varint: reimplement as test balloon for Rust Patrick Steinhardt via GitGitGadget
2025-09-17 5:58 ` [PATCH v2 00/18] Introduce rust: In xdiff Patrick Steinhardt
2025-09-19 20:57 ` Ezekiel Newren
2025-09-22 13:01 ` Patrick Steinhardt
2025-09-22 15:31 ` Ezekiel Newren
2025-09-22 16:08 ` Patrick Steinhardt
2025-09-22 16:47 ` Junio C Hamano
2025-09-22 17:23 ` Ezekiel Newren
2025-09-22 17:32 ` Ezekiel Newren
2025-09-22 18:17 ` Junio C Hamano
2025-09-22 18:33 ` Ezekiel Newren
2025-09-22 18:41 ` Junio C Hamano
2025-09-22 18:12 ` Junio C Hamano
2025-09-17 17:07 ` Junio C Hamano
2025-09-17 20:44 ` Junio C Hamano
2025-09-17 21:34 ` Elijah Newren
2025-09-17 22:48 ` Junio C Hamano
2025-09-22 13:01 ` Patrick Steinhardt
2025-09-22 15:18 ` Ezekiel Newren
2025-09-22 16:15 ` Patrick Steinhardt
2025-09-22 16:27 ` Ezekiel Newren
2025-09-23 5:11 ` Patrick Steinhardt
2025-09-23 16:32 ` Ezekiel Newren
2025-09-23 18:05 ` Ezekiel Newren
2025-09-23 21:04 ` Junio C Hamano
Reply instructions:
You may reply publicly to this message via plain-text email
using any one of the following methods:
* Save the following mbox file, import it into your mail client,
and reply-to-all from there: mbox
Avoid top-posting and favor interleaved quoting:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Posting_style#Interleaved_style
* Reply using the --to, --cc, and --in-reply-to
switches of git-send-email(1):
git send-email \
--in-reply-to=8e030170ddc3e6307760fa12387b8b4310ae5e26.1758071798.git.gitgitgadget@gmail.com \
--to=gitgitgadget@gmail$(echo .)com \
--cc=ezekielnewren@gmail$(echo .)com \
--cc=git@vger$(echo .)kernel.org \
--cc=ps@pks$(echo .)im \
/path/to/YOUR_REPLY
https://kernel.org/pub/software/scm/git/docs/git-send-email.html
Be sure your reply has a Subject: header at the top and a blank line
before the message body.
This is a public inbox, see mirroring instructions
for how to clone and mirror all data and code used for this inbox