[tex-live] Re: Re: Re: Aleph versioning

[Olaf Weber]

Karl Berry writes:

>>     You do NOT want "release candidate" numbers like 'rc3' in
>>     \Alephrevision.  A release candidate had better pretend in all but its
>>     banner to the release.

> Why do you say this?  It seems to me that the whole point of a version
> number is to uniquely identify the release.

IMHO a "release candidate" specifically should have the behaviour of
the final product, with the exception of some printed banners.

> If you fake the version number to say it's version 2 when it's really
> 1.9rc2 (or whatever), then anyone who wants to distinguish has to
> find some method other than the version number to do so, obviating the
> whole point of having version numbers in the first place.

But a release candidate for version two of an interpreter should, for
the purpose of (say) scripts that run on this interpreter, claim to
_be_ version two.  Otherwise the scripts are misled, or worse, the
scripts have to be made aware of the (typically non-standard and
non-numerical) version identification scheme used for "release
candidates".

> (Personally, I don't believe in "release candidates" anyway, but never mind.)

-- 
Olaf Weber

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