Client spec: `osx` and `macos`

[niklasmohrin]

Hi everyone!

Over at tealdeer we wanted to allow users to specify macos as a platform for filtering pages (see tealdeer-rs/tealdeer#108 (comment) and tealdeer-rs/tealdeer#215).

It would of course be great if we could get confirmation from you guys that you won't add a "macos" platform any time soon - or a hard "no" if you are planning to do so. Maybe this alias could even manifest itself in the client spec as a recommendation or option. After all, the operating system is not called "osx" anymore.

Is this alias something the client spec authors would approve or are we shooting ourselves in the foot here? I would love to hear your thoughts on this!

Slightly related: #5013

[CleanMachine1]

As mentioned in one of the issues, changing will break a lot of clients or functionality. Some clients are actively used by people however no longer maintained.

Until we make the entire switch which doesn't look likely yet, I feel tealdeer using an "alias" of some kind in its code would be the best solution.

don't take my word as any final say! I am just 1 of the many maintainers with different opinions.

[pixelcmtd]

The best solution for all clients would be to have a check like

if "pages/macos" exists:
    alias "osx" to "macos"
else:
    alias "macos" to "osx"

as getting that into 90% of the clients allows for a very smooth transition.

[dbrgn]

Hm, I think it would be easier to keep the osx name for the pages directory. It doesn't hurt, as it's not part of the user-facing API.

However, the macos alias could be made into a recommendation in the client spec.

[sbrl]

Hmmmmm, this is a great point. Ideally, we should move osx to macos, but as you say it would unfortunately break clients. Aside from assessing the various clients to see which ones would actually break, an alias would be a great thing to add in the meantime to the spec. Would you like to open a pull request for that?