[RFC] Improve compatibility with legacy versions

[clue]

Because why not… :-)

Now more seriously: This project is a low level lib that is used as a building block for quite a few higher level abstractions on top of it. As such, compatibility (even with significantly outdated versions) is a major concern to me.

Note that I'm not suggesting putting significant amount of work into this. The patch is already here and, personally, I see little harm in supporting this.

Also note that I'm not suggesting we need to keep support indefinitely. Should this ever turn out to be a burden in the future, e.g. because we actually require any new language features or some external lib, then I'm all for dropping support again.

[alcohol]

Because you are basically telling users that you condone the use of outdated and no longer supported versions, which sets a bad example and further degrades the general PHP landscape we all have to work in.

[cboden]

@alcohol As a member of the composer group I'm sure you understand how hard it is for some people to upgrade beyond 5.3.

This library doesn't have any parts that use new language features so I don't see any harm in increasing the potential user base.

[alcohol]

I understand, and I have to accept it, but I don't agree with it. Also, Composer has a large existing user base still running on it. Is that really the same case here? Cause, supporting it to "reach a larger audience" really doesn't seem like the right reason to me. Anyway, just my 2 cents. You can't blame me for trying :-(.

[clue]

@alcohol I think you're raising a very valid point here.

Personally, I wouldn't endorse using legacy versions and encourage everybody to upgrade to supported versions for various reasons (new language features, performance improvements, security support etc.).

Despite this, I don't consider pushing (or condoning) anybody my business.

Being a long time contributor to this project, I do, however, consider helping advance and improve this project to be my business. And unless there's a compelling reason, I don't see why these improvements should only reach a part of our user base, excluding a (reasonable sized) portion of our existing users, stuck on legacy versions.

[WyriHaximus]

Tbh I have no objections against this that I didn't already express in the related PR's. Both of you have valid arguments but the changes are to small and insignificant not to do it.