On Jan 10, 2012, at 7:57 AM, Antoine Pitrou wrote:

> On Tue, 10 Jan 2012 08:49:04 +0000
> Rob Cliffe <rob.cli...@btinternet.com> wrote:
>> But "minor version" and "major version" are readily understandable to 
>> the general reader, e.g. me, whereas "feature release" and "release 
>> series" I find are not.  Couldn't the first two terms be defined once 
>> and then used throughout?
> 
> To me "minor" is a bugfix release, e.g. 2.7.2, and "major" is a feature
> release, e.g. 3.3.  I have a hard time considering 3.2 or 3.3 "minor".

Whatever your personal feelings, there is a precedent established in the API:

>>> sys.version_info.major
2
>>> sys.version_info.minor
7
>>> sys.version_info.micro
1

This strikes me as the most authoritative definition of the terms, in the 
context of Python.  (Although the fact that this precedent is widely 
established elsewhere doesn't hurt.)

Whatever term is chosen, the important thing is to apply the terminology 
consistently so that it's clear what is meant.  I doubt that anyone has a term 
which every reader will intuitively and immediately associate with "middle 
dot-separated digit increment by one".

If you want to emphasize the importance of a release, just choose a subjective 
term aside from "major" or "minor".

-glyph

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