[Epel-packagers-sig] [Bug 2277782] New: Package older clang-formats on newer Fedoras

https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=2277782

Bug ID: 2277782
           Summary: Package older clang-formats on newer Fedoras
           Product: Fedora
           Version: 39
                OS: Linux
            Status: NEW
         Component: clang16
          Keywords: RFE
          Severity: medium
          Assignee: [e-mail]
          Reporter: [e-mail]
                CC: [e-mail],
                    [e-mail],
                    [e-mail], [e-mail]
  Target Milestone: ---
    Classification: Fedora

Fedora packages clang-format, an automatic C/C++ code reformatting tool used by
various FOSS projects, including the kernel and Mesa. Some project's CI systems
enforce developer use of clang-format to produce a consistent style across the
code base.

However, clang-format's output is not stable from version to version, as
upstream clang-format tweaks affect the results. Projects therefore pin a
single "blessed" version of clang-format that all contributors use.

Other distributions like Debian package simultaneously multiple versions of
LLVM (and hence multiple version suffixed clang-formats), so contributors can
install whatever the agreed upon version is without needing the whole team to
use the same distro. Unfortunately, Fedora only packages a single latest clang
version... and as soon as the Fedora LLVM is newer than what the project was
using, boom! formatting changes randomly and the developer can no longer
contribute.

Therefore, this is a request to package older clang-formats even on newer
Fedoras. For my own use case, I need clang-format-16 on F39 (soon F40), since
that's the version FEX-Emu pins. But F39 only has clang-format-17, which is
incompatible.

Is it reasonable to include the older binaries in the newer Fedoras? If not,
what is a reasonable workaround (that doesn't require switching from Fedora to
another distro)?

Reproducible: Always