ModuleHandler::parseDependency should be public

Updated: Comment #0

Problem/Motivation

Drupal 7 had the useful function drupal_parse_dependency to parse dependencies declared in the "example (>7.x-2.3)" format.

This was useful for contrib and was used in Libraries API as libraries use the same mechanism to declare dependencies.

In Drupal 8 the parsing is now done in the protected function \Drupal\Core\Extension\ModuleHandler::parseDependency(). The function is therefore inaccessible to contrib and would have to be copied. This is a regression in DX.

Proposed resolution

Make \Drupal\Core\Extension\ModuleHandler::parseDependency() public.

Since it is a utility function and does not access object state at all, tstoeckler proposes that it be made static as well. This is what we do with other utility methods (see \Drupal\(Core/Component)\Utility) and so should not offend OO purists any more than existing code. I am also open to moving this method to a separate utility class in case people find that this would be "tainting" ModuleHandler.

API changes

Before:

drupal_parse_dependency($dependency)

After:

use Drupal\Core\Extension\ModuleHandler;

ModuleHandler::parseDependency($dependency)

Note that there is currently no change notice for the removal of drupal_parse_dependency() :-/