I hear you and I get what you're saying. However, to argue the other side, maybe it's a decision based on the possibility of long maintenance going forward. Kee

I hear you and I get what you're saying. However, to argue the other side, maybe it's a decision based on the possibility of long maintenance going forward. Keeping track of, in your example, PHP and all of its various versions is mentally daunting. What's wrong with a project just saying, "Hey look, we're not saying it won't work for you, but if you're running these older versions, we just don't give you any guarantees that it does. YMMV." e.g. say a bug comes up in the library, and say that it only affects older versions of PHP. Why can't the project just shrug its shoulders and be truthful that it doesn't have interest in maintenance/support against those old versions? It's better that the project declares this intention now, before the bug comes up, then later having to part ways with the old versions more abruptly. This is why OSS is great, as you can decide if, at the time said bug is found, that you want to provide legacy support for older PHP versions, maybe through a fork or other means. Have at it, it's your software too.