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Discussion on: Decision Time: PHP Framework Dilemma

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syntaxseed profile image
SyntaxSeed (Sherri W)

Thanks for your comment. Though to be honest, Laravel's instability is the root cause of my dilemma, or I would have jumped on Laravel without hesitation. I recently learned Laravel and created a college course on it - so I'd choose it if I could. But I get the impression that backward breaking changes are a frequent part of Laravel's updates. And things are changed and removed on a whim.

I hear that v6 is going to start using SemVer. Which is nice... but Taylor has expressed that this won't slow down the pace or style of updates for Laravel - so I suspect the major version number will jump up frequently which doesn't really solve the problem.

I think it's great that Laravel is going through this rapid evolution. I'm sure this is leading Laravel quickly to a really awesome state (it's already awesome), and if I had only one giant project to focus on I'd choose Laravel in a heartbeat. But since will potentially have many, many projects on the framework I choose, I can't be going through BC breaking updates so frequently.

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starvsion profile image
Junhai

If backward compatibility is that important, go for laravel LTS, which is either 5.5 or 6.0... That should settle your mind a bit...

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jimbolino profile image
Jimbolino

LTS versions for laravel are supported for 2-3 years (bugs-security)

Symfony has 3-4 years of updates on their LTS versions
symfony.com/roadmap

Personally I use laravel (4.2 + 5.5) and never had problems with backwards incompatibility.
Upgrade paths are clearly documented, and there are also free and payed upgrade tools available.