Re: version numbering

On Tuesday 16 December 2003 18:15, Greg Hudson wrote:
> > Because that is what the developers of each project have specified. The
> > Linux developers mandate that 2.4 and 2.6 are two different release
> > generations. Similarly, Mozilla 1.5 and 1.6 are defined by their
> > development team as two minor releases in the same generation.
>
> You're saying "because Mozilla has more frequent releases?" That has
> nothing to do with the version numbers. If Mozilla slowed down releases
> but kept their version numbering, then Mozilla 1.5 and Mozilla 1.6 would
> be just as different as Linux 2.4 and Linux 2.6. That would also hold
> true if Linux sped up their release cycle and made fewer changes between
> 2.4 and 2.6.
>
> (Your use of the word "generation" only served to confuse the issue for
> me. What's a "generation?" When Mozilla had bugfixes to make to 1.4,
> they put out 1.4.1, not 1.5.)

The Linux version numbering works as following: version with an even second
version number (2.0, 2.2, 2.4, 2.6) are "stable". This means that there
aren't any major changes in these lines, especially not API changes. Versions
with an odd second version number (2.1, 2.3, 2.5) are development version
which means they change a lot, even in dramatic ways. Once the dust settles
and Linus thinks a development version is getting stable it gets an even
version number again.

There were really dramatic changes between 2.4 and 2.6 including several API
changes, new Virtual Memory, new scheduler, etc. pp. These are VERY dramatic
changes when it comes to an OS kernel :-)

Now what John meant (I think) is that Mozilla 1.4 and 1.5 are like Linux
2.4.21 and 2.4.22, so that you can compare the amount of dramatic changes
would suggest that Mozilla 1.x is more like Linux 2.4.x and a future Mozilla
2.x would be more like a Linux 2.6.x

It's just different flavours of versioning. Especially commercial products
nowadays don't do any x.y releases any more and just say release x (like
Corel Draw 8, Corel Draw 9, ... even if the changes weren't very dramatic).
And in the OpenSource community you often see version numbers like 1.2.54pl2
or even more obscure numberings.

I maintain a Linux distro and had to write a small tool that compares version
number to tell which one is the bigger one... I can tell you this task is not
as trivial as it sounds :-)

It all comes down to what flavour of version numbers do the developers prefer.
And what they consider to be the version number of the "finished" product
containing all features. Like SubVersion devs always talk about the Holy 1.0,
which they consider to be the version number for the "finished" product...
other would say that 0.1 would be as good a number for the finished product
and coordinate their numbering accordingly...

-- 
Marc Haisenko
Systemspezialist
Webport IT-Services GmbH
mailto: haisenko@webport.de
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