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Re: Debian versioning scheme (r1 vs .1)



On Mon, Nov 04, 2002 at 07:05:09PM +0100, Morten Brix Pedersen wrote:
> I am wondering why updates to the Debian GNU/Linux distribution uses the
> much alternative versioning syntax, such as 2.2r7, 3.0r1 etc.
> 
> In my opinion, 3.0.1 is a much clearer and more commonly used syntax.

Version numbers are arbitrary and meaningless.  It is simply a
designation, and we happen to have a standard for ours.  Perhaps it's
good that we're not using a commonly used syntax, because although the
syntax may be common, the meaning may not be.

> 
> ..or is it just me who thinks the latter is much nicer?

Everybody has their own opinion.  Personally, I don't mind the r*
system, but I'd like to do away with "point" releases.  I think we
should have Debian version 1, version 2, 3, 4, etc.  When you only
come up with a new release once a year at best, all releases are "major"
releases.  The change from Debian 2.1 to 2.2 was just as major as from
2.2 to 3.0.  

In a sense, nobody in Debian actually cares about the version numbers at
all anyway (at least not as I've described them) since we just call
releases by their codenames anyway.  Using codenames is essentially the
same thing as what I'd like to see with version numbers.  Every time a
new major release comes out, it gets a new code name.  I think it'd be
more consistant if we gave it a completely new version number as well,
but I don't care enough to push for this change.

noah

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