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If I do :PluginUpdate, how could I be sure developers of the plugins listed in .vimrc as links to git repositories have not updated their repositories with breaking changes?

For example, I am using link to the repository Plugin 'tpope/vim-fugitive' and I don't want this dependency to introduce breaking changes on the next upgrade.

In general, does development of vim plugins entail convention of not putting breaking changes into the latest master branch? I doubt such convention exist, but still, is there kind of policy for vim plugins to avoid breaking configuration with plugins upgrade?

altern
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1 Answers1

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In general, you have to trust the plugin developer on this one.

  • Most plugins have a changelog in some form; ideally, you would check that before the update (but doing that would reduce the automation benefits of :PluginUpdate). If you notice that a plugin got broken, manual upgrade steps should be found in the changelog, and help you to quickly resolve the problem.
  • Some plugins tag releases or offer a stable branch for tested official releases. Using that as the basis for the update should greatly reduce the opportunities for regressions caused by using intermediate development snapshots.
  • Ideally, there would be separate stable/major-version branches, and the plugin would follow Semantic Versioning, so you're guaranteed to only receive compatible changes automatically, and switching to a new incompatible version would be a manual, controlled step.
Ingo Karkat
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