| API Stability |
| ============= |
| |
| From its first release, ``cryptography`` will have a strong API stability |
| policy. |
| |
| What does this policy cover? |
| ---------------------------- |
| |
| This policy includes any API or behavior that is documented in this |
| documentation. |
| |
| What does "stable" mean? |
| ------------------------ |
| |
| * Public APIs will not be removed or renamed without providing a compatibility |
| alias. |
| * The behavior of existing APIs will not change. |
| |
| What doesn't this policy cover? |
| ------------------------------- |
| |
| * We may add new features, things like the result of ``dir(obj))`` or the |
| contents of ``obj.__dict__`` may change. |
| * Objects are not guaranteed to be pickleable, and pickled objects from one |
| version of ``cryptography`` may not be loadable in future versions. |
| * Development versions of ``cryptography``. Before a feature is in a release, |
| it is not covered by this policy and may change. |
| |
| Security |
| ~~~~~~~~ |
| |
| One exception to our API stability policy is for security. We will violate this |
| policy as necessary in order to resolve a security issue or harden |
| ``cryptography`` against a possible attack. |
| |
| Deprecation |
| ----------- |
| |
| From time to time we will want to change the behavior of an API or remove it |
| entirely. In that case, here's how the process will work: |
| |
| * In ``cryptography X.Y`` the feature exists. |
| * In ``cryptography X.Y+1`` using that feature will emit a |
| ``PendingDeprecationWarning``. |
| * In ``cryptography X.Y+2`` using that feature will emit a |
| ``DeprecationWarning``. |
| * In ``cryptography X.Y+3`` the feature will be removed or changed. |
| |
| In short, code that runs without warnings will always continue to work for a |
| period of two releases. |