search

Bioconductor / BiocClassesWorkingGroup

Notes and Discussion concerning recommended classes for Bioconductor
2 stars 0 forks source link

Label Bioconductor classes #13

Open hpages opened 1 year ago

hpages commented 1 year ago

Suggested by Francesc Català-Moll on the community-bioc Slack:

Hello everyone, I would like to open a discussion about the use of classes in package development for Bioconductor. I have followed Bioconductor’s guidelines and used existing S4 classes for my package. However, during the review, I was suggested to use a more modern class. I understand that this suggestion may be intended to improve the compatibility or performance of my package in the future. However, this would require a significant rewrite of my code, which is challenging given the time I have already invested in developing my package using a Bioconductor class. I think it would be helpful if Bioconductor could tag classes to help developers make more informed decisions about which classes to use. Some possible tags could be:

  1. “Deprecated”: For classes that are no longer recommended for use.
  2. “Legacy”: For classes that are still used in some existing packages, but are not recommended for new developments.
  3. “Recommended”: For classes that are recommended for use in the development of new packages.
  4. “Experimental”: For classes that are in development or testing phase.

This could prevent situations where developers invest time in using a class, only to find out later that there is a newer or preferred class available. I would like to hear what others think about this topic. Have you had similar experiences? Do you think it would be helpful to have tags indicating the status of classes? Thank you for your time and I look forward to your feedback.