Re: [Gnu-arch-users] What are version numbers?

[Bruce Stephens]

Tom Lord <address@hidden> writes:

>     > From: Zack Brown <address@hidden>
>
>     > > Hmm.  Probably too late, though.
>
>     > Not really. Just implement both "category--branch--version" and
>     > "category--series--branch", but deprecate the former. tla could detect 
> which
>     > one was in use because "version" (or "series") is composed only of 
> numbers
>     > and periods while "branch" is almost certainly alphabetical.
>
>     > Older projects could continue to do what they're doing, while newer
>     > projects could use the clearer syntax.
>
>
> Why is one "clearer" than the other, exactly?

Because the grouping more accurately reflects the structure of things.
tla--1.1--devo and tla--1.1--lord are more closely related than
tla--1.1--devo and tla--1.0--devo.  (I'd presume, anyway.)  So it
makes more sense to regard tla--1.1 as being a unit of something, and
to split that into two branches, than it does to regard tla--devo as
something which is split into two versions.

Probably you don't regard the tuple <category,branch,version> as being
ordered in that kind of sense, and I find it easier to ignore the
ordering.  However, people seem to see it as ordered and find the
ordering confusing, and I think the ordering category--version--branch
actually makes some kind of sense, and so would be less confusing.