Re: lynx-dev progress on pre.2

[purslow]

040118 Thomas Dickey wrote:
> On Sat, Jan 17, 2004 at 10:18:40PM -0500, address@hidden wrote:
>> back when i first blundered into lynx.dev 9609, '2.6' had just come out.
>> it had been released too quickly by a frantic Foteos Macrides
>> & contained many bugs, which required a new version '2.7' c 9702.
>> subseq'ly, there were versions '2.7.1' & '2.7.2' fairly quickly, then '2.8'.
>> there were a few 'pre' or 'rc' versions shortly before these releases,
>> but nothing like the series of  17  (so far) '2.8.5devs'.
> Some numbers (there were no "pre" patches until just before 2.8):
>   before 2.8          16 patches       2  months      0.9Mb
>   before 2.8.1        42 patches       7  months      1.0Mb
>   before 2.8.2        39 patches       7  months      1.7Mb
>   before 2.8.3        31 patches       9  months      2.0Mb
>   before 2.8.4        29 patches      15  months      2.2Mb
>   before 2.8.5        16 patches      30+ months      2.8Mb

well yes, this shows how the delay has grown with each 'x.y.z' release.

>> somehow the numbering system got distorted & has remained so for years.
>> can we please get it back to sanity?  that's all: i leave it to TD.
> I would have preferred to release 2.8.5 late in 2002,
> but found that I would not get a consensus.
> Preparing a release takes much more time than preparing a development patch,
> since I do check that lynx runs on all of the platforms available to me,
> has no known serious problems introduced since the last release, etc.

none of that is in dispute, not by me anyway.

> Lynx development versions are equivalent
> to the release versions of many other projects.

that IS the point.  what you seem to be overlooking in all this
is that in usual parlance 'dev' implies 'unstable', st most people believe
the last stable release of Lynx was back in 2001 (your "30+ months" above).
in fact, there has rarely been anything unstable re any 2.8.5dev.n version:
in terms of stability -- 'dev' vs 'release' -- 2.8.5dev.n's correspond
to what wb  2.9.1  2.9.2  ...  2.9.17  in other leading projects,
incl XFCE & the Linux kernel (hardly scrape-the-barrel Sourceforge stuff).

> Packagers who are paying attention already know this.

well, that's like saying: "Everybody in my family knows
that when I say 'right' I mean 'left' & it's in the family blog too,
so why can't other people out there pay proper attention?"

your coding efforts sb highly regarded & are always appreciated by me,
but you need to take a step back & look at what has happened to version no's.

-- 
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SUPPORT     ___________//___,  Philip Webb : address@hidden
ELECTRIC   /] [] [] [] [] []|  Centre for Urban & Community Studies
TRANSIT    `-O----------O---'  University of Toronto

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