Hi - In order to not delay 15.0.0-rc3 (and 15.0.0) I will merge the patch as proposed above to add a option to switch back to ABI version. I know that it’s not what some of you want (both because of fragmentation and that we should just commit to have ABI as SOVERSION) - but at this time and this late in the cycle I think it’s the most prudent thing to do. The patch was reverted on main because real world issues and while it was maybe done a bit hastily I don’t feel confident enough to revert the revert on the release branch only.
I hope that we can have this discussion before 16.0.0 branching and not have these questions come up late in the cycle so that there is enough time to discuss all of the sides and come to true consensus.
Thanks everyone that have given their feedback and contributed to the patch!