[webkit-gtk] Deciding the deprecation path for WebKit1

[Martin Robinson]

We've been shipping WebKit2GTK+ as stable for almost one year now, and
I think that we all agree that it has grown to be a much more mature
and high-quality WebKit than WebKitGTK+ ever was. The maintenance and
consistent release of a WebKit port is a huge undertaking for a small
community, but we have been maintaining two ports all this time! We
have also reached out to our downstream embedders encouraging them to
port to the new API, in some cases even doing the port ourselves.

I think it is time to decide in what manner we should deprecate
WebKit1. As a starting point for discussion, I will make a proposal:

* Before the next stable branch (webkit-2.6), move all WebKit1
development to a branch. We can then remove the WebKit1 code from
trunk. This means that trunk developers will no longer have to
consider the original WebKitGTK+ port when making changes. We can also
safely turn off the WebKit1 buildbot.

* Continue to merge important patches to the WebKit1 branch and make
releases in that series.

This means that WebKit1GTK+ development would continue for about one
year at least. If there are people in the community who want to
continue maintaining WebKti1 after that time, I'm not opposed.

--Martin