Recompile required at 9.4 / Policy Files

[GeraldMarbury]

9.4 rocks I can't wait for it to get out.

The following statement is made in the "Migrating ArcGIS 9.3 Desktop and Engine custom components to ArcGIS 9.4" document.

"Additionally at ArcGIS 9.4, ESRI no longer provides policy files. Consequently, all ArcGIS 9.3 development projects ported to 9.4 must be recompiled."

I have extensions that work on 9.2, 9.3, and 9.3.1. I believe requiring a compile is a grave mistake for at least 3 reasons.

1) Hinders incremental migrations
A brave (or desperate) end user should be able to upgrade to 9.4 and at least try their third party tools. However, many organizations will not be able to take advantage of features because they depend on some third party partner who has not migrated thier code yet. So the entire organization has to wait to get the benefits of 9.4. This kind of defeats the purpose of great works like the "ArcGIS® 9.3.1 geodatabase direct connect for 9.2 clients." In fact, it's kind of fitting to quote from this tool because I believe the same reasoning should apply here also.

"Various groups within an organization may have different requirements and timelines that necessitate their client applications remain at 9.2 Service Pack 5 while other groups want to upgrade to 9.3.1 clients [........] you can upgrade your geodatabase to an ArcSDE® 9.3.1 release so your 9.2 clients can take advantage of functionality present in the software at 9.3.1, and leave other users on 9.2 Service Pack 5 or later service pack clientsâ??and they will still be able to make a direct connection to the geodatabase."--ESRI

2) Too hard for BP's to support
Many end users are one or two versions behind the last stable release. Too often the partner needs to support both the new version and the previous versions with the same codebase and binary. Test me, put out a poll.

3) VB6 is dead, but COM is still alive--- isn't it?
Because VB6 has been dead a while now, ESRI is doing the right thing to abandon it. However, even with the new addin model, COM is still supported. It seems like as long as COM is supported the policy files that allow for cross version deploments should be provided too.

Also, it's not clear how to get the primary interop assemblies unlocked for deployment. Will the end user have to have the SDK?

Keep up the good work

[RichardWatson]

Based on the changes ESRI made, I do not think that it is possible for them to issue publisher policy files.  Restated, I think that a policy file redirects a reference from an old assembly to a new assembly.  This assumes that there is a 1 to 1 relationship (bijective mapping if you will) between the old the new.

In 9.4, ESRI has moved types between assemblies, split existing assemblies up, and (in general) rearranged the assemblies in the GAC.  In essence the the level (and more importantly nature) of the changes do not support this (in my humble opinion).

A fair question to ask is whether the pain was worth the gain.  Unfortunately, that point is moot.