Subject: Re: [RFC/PATCH] perl: bump the required Perl version to 5.10.0 from 5.8.0

From: Junio C Hamano <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 27 Dec 2017 10:51:15 -0800

Eric Wong <[email-masked]> writes:

> Fair enough, I haven't run 5.8 in a while, either.  One concern
> I have is it makes reviewing more difficult as the language gets
> bigger and (even more) unfamiliar constructs pop up.  This is
> probably more important for git as most of us are not dedicated
> Perl hackers.

Yes, but that cuts both ways.  When we do get a less amateur Perl
folks who contribute and review, they are more and more likely to be
fluent in modern versions of Perl than the ancient ones some of us
who learned the tongue long time ago are familiar with.  Telling
them to limit themselves to what is also available in ancient
versions is a burden that is backwards.

So

> What mostly bugs me about this is going from:
>
> 	"we'll accept patches to keep your old system working"
>
>  to:
>
> 	"your software is too old, upgrade or go away"

is something we need to be able to say at some point.