As long as a setup tool (like YaST) provides the end-user an easy way to switch back and forth there is no real problem. Initially the old stuff was the default, then we switched to the new stuff as default (this is the actual switch from the end-users point of view), and a longer time later we dropped the old stuff - first we dropped support for the old stuff in YaST but kept its RPM packages and at the very end we dropped also the old stuff packages.
Via our openSUSE build service I can provide a new sane-backends at any time via a separated package repository so that interested users can install it on demand whenever they like (but there would be no automated replacement of an installed sane-backends package on a user's system). Kind Regards Johannes Meixner -- SUSE LINUX Products GmbH, Maxfeldstrasse 5, 90409 Nuernberg, Germany AG Nuernberg, HRB 16746, GF: Markus Rex
