Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-25 Thread Markus Wanner

Hi,

On 08/21/2010 10:11 PM, Peter Geoghegan wrote:

We changed 8.5 to 9.0 explicitly because doing so was good marketing,


That's exactly how I see this as well. The current scheme allows for 
some flexibility for marketing purposes while still being 
self-consistent and logical in numbering.


sarcasm And it allows us to have heated debates about whether or not 
the next release is worth a major version bump. /sarcasm


Regards

Markus

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-22 Thread Sergio A. Kessler
On Sat, Aug 21, 2010 at 1:00 PM, Greg Stark gsst...@mit.edu wrote:
 On Sat, Aug 21, 2010 at 4:29 AM, Sergio A. Kessler
 sergiokess...@gmail.com wrote:
 on every single planet of the universe, except the one called
 postgrearth, whose inhabitants breathe sql and eat messages from
 postgresql mailing lists... :-)

 most people I know, think 8.1 is just 8.0 with some fixes...

 Really? is Linux 2.6 just 2.5 with some fixes? Glibc 2.Was Windows 3.5
 just 3.4 with some fixes? Gnome 2.28 just 2.27 with some fixes?

really !,
they don't have *any* idea of the version of the kernel, they know
about redhat 4, redhat 5 and so on...

glibc ? what is that ?
is not something they use...  :-)

sure, we know better, but the common guy in the computer field, does
not read every mailing list on earth...


 In fact perusing dpkg -l output the *only* software package I find
 that bumps the major version every single release is Emacs. It stands
 out as an outlier as soon as you say version 23 -- and that was
 despite a hiatus when version 18.59 was the newest release for years.

imho, emacs does it rigth...

regards,
/sak

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-21 Thread Sergio A. Kessler
 The current system give people the completely false impression that
 7.0 and 7.4 are somehow similar.

 On what planet?

on every single planet of the universe, except the one called
postgrearth, whose inhabitants breathe sql and eat messages from
postgresql mailing lists... :-)

most people I know, think 8.1 is just 8.0 with some fixes...

regards,
/sak

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-21 Thread Stefan Kaltenbrunner
On 08/20/2010 09:04 PM, David E. Wheeler wrote:
 On Aug 20, 2010, at 12:02 PM, Greg Stark wrote:
 
 Again, it means the format would be consistent. Always three integers. Nice 
 thing about Semantic Versions is that if you append any ASCII string to the 
 third integer, it automatically means less than that integer.


 So I count three integers in both 9.0rc1 and 9.0beta4
 
 No, I mean 9.0.0beta4. If we were to adopt the Semantic Versioning spec, one 
 would *always* use X.Y.Z, with optional ASCII characters appended to Z to add 
 meaning (including less than unadorned Z).

hmm FWIW I would interpret something like 9.0.1B4 as the forth beta
release for the first point release of the major release 9.0 bis seems
stupid and is not anything we have done before.

You could argue that 9.0.0B4 is the foourth beta for the first
production release of 9.0 but I find the current naming much more
reasonable...


Stefan

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-21 Thread David E. Wheeler
On Aug 21, 2010, at 1:45 AM, Stefan Kaltenbrunner wrote:

 hmm FWIW I would interpret something like 9.0.1B4 as the forth beta
 release for the first point release of the major release 9.0 bis seems
 stupid and is not anything we have done before.

It does't make sense for PostgreSQL, no.

 You could argue that 9.0.0B4 is the foourth beta for the first
 production release of 9.0 but I find the current naming much more
 reasonable...

Yeah, it's just semantics, really.

Best,

David



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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-21 Thread Greg Stark
On Sat, Aug 21, 2010 at 4:29 AM, Sergio A. Kessler
sergiokess...@gmail.com wrote:
 on every single planet of the universe, except the one called
 postgrearth, whose inhabitants breathe sql and eat messages from
 postgresql mailing lists... :-)

 most people I know, think 8.1 is just 8.0 with some fixes...

Really? is Linux 2.6 just 2.5 with some fixes? Glibc 2.Was Windows 3.5
just 3.4 with some fixes? Gnome 2.28 just 2.27 with some fixes?

In fact perusing dpkg -l output the *only* software package I find
that bumps the major version every single release is Emacs. It stands
out as an outlier as soon as you say version 23 -- and that was
despite a hiatus when version 18.59 was the newest release for years.

Here is the Gnome project's description of what's new in 2.28 (over
2.26, the previous public release):

The GNOME Project's focus on users and usability continues in GNOME
2.28 with its hundreds of bug fixes and user-requested improvements.
The sheer number of enhancements makes it impossible to list every
change and improvement made, but these notes aim to highlight some of
the more exciting, user-oriented features in this release.

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-21 Thread Joshua D. Drake
On Sat, 2010-08-21 at 17:00 +0100, Greg Stark wrote:
 On Sat, Aug 21, 2010 at 4:29 AM, Sergio A. Kessler
 sergiokess...@gmail.com wrote:
  on every single planet of the universe, except the one called
  postgrearth, whose inhabitants breathe sql and eat messages from
  postgresql mailing lists... :-)
 
  most people I know, think 8.1 is just 8.0 with some fixes...
 
 Really? is Linux 2.6 just 2.5 with some fixes? Glibc 2.Was Windows 3.5
 just 3.4 with some fixes? Gnome 2.28 just 2.27 with some fixes?

Thank you for this. It validates something that has been nagging me.

Do you really think the majority of users even know what kernel they are
running? They don't. They know they are running Ubuntu or Fedora. They
probably know the version but they have no idea what version of the
kernel that is being run.

PostgreSQL is a user space project. Yes we have a solid core of -hackers
but our wider use is a place where hackers don't exist. User space
developers do. I.e; PHP people. 

Reminder, there was no Windows 3.4 or Windows 3.5. Yes it does matter.
There was:

3.1x
3.11 for Workgroups
Windows NT 3.1
Windows NT 3.5
Windows NT 4.0
(I am ignoring ME)
Windows XP

There was *NEVER* a Windows NT 4.0.x, there was Windows NT 4.0 SP2. 

The semantics are important. People mock Microsoft but except for some
notable blunders (Windows ME, splurt) they are very, very good at
getting mind share.


 Here is the Gnome project's description of what's new in 2.28 (over
 2.26, the previous public release):

Gnome is a bad example. People barely know if at all they are running
Gnome. They are running Ubuntu.

Sincerely,

Joshua D. Drake
 

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-21 Thread Tom Lane
Joshua D. Drake j...@commandprompt.com writes:
 PostgreSQL is a user space project. Yes we have a solid core of -hackers
 but our wider use is a place where hackers don't exist. User space
 developers do. I.e; PHP people. 

This is utter nonsense.  We're a database, not a desktop.
People who even know what a database is, let alone program one,
are sufficiently geeky to be aware of the usual conventions for
software version numbering.  Or at least to RTFM if they don't.

regards, tom lane

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-21 Thread Greg Stark
On Sat, Aug 21, 2010 at 5:51 PM, Joshua D. Drake j...@commandprompt.com wrote:
 There was *NEVER* a Windows NT 4.0.x, there was Windows NT 4.0 SP2.


I'm not sure what you're point is here. There was a NT 4.0 followed by
SP1 through SP6. followed by NT 5.0, 5.1, 5.2, 6.0, 6.1, and 7.0. They
also had brand names 2000, XP, 2003, Vista, 7, etc -- is this model
less confusing?

The whole point here is that there is a pretty broad consensus across
software projects that the first digit is for major releases that
change the whole product character -- Linux 2.0, Samba 3.x, Libc 6,
Even Windows 4 and Oracle 8.  The second is for releases that add
features, and the third digit is for minor releases. Our release
numbering scheme is the same used by the vast majority of software
packages.

There are marketing pressures that cause version number inflation like
Oracle 9i, 10g, 11g where regular releases are branded as huge
improvements to warrant spending extra money on them.

Sometimes the reverse happens and companies release regular releases
and want to avoid bumping the number from a popular version. Things
like Win 98 SP2 or Oracle 8i.

But those are marketing pressures that large companies feel to deceive
their users into misunderstanding what they're being sold. Open source
projects have generally not felt pressures like that and have been
able to just use regular version numbering schemes that users
understand.

Now we're getting the blowback from users confused by these marketing
schemes who no longer understand how normal version number schemes
work. There's no evidence that adopting marketing driven version
numbering will confuse these people any less -- they're probably
perpetually confused about software release engineerng -- and there's
every reason to think that it would confuse the 99% of our users who
are perfectly accustomed to software version numbering schemes much
more to use an unusual scheme used only by a handful of other projects
and (inconsistently) by big marketing departments.

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-21 Thread Joshua D. Drake
On Sat, 2010-08-21 at 13:12 -0400, Tom Lane wrote:
 Joshua D. Drake j...@commandprompt.com writes:
  PostgreSQL is a user space project. Yes we have a solid core of -hackers
  but our wider use is a place where hackers don't exist. User space
  developers do. I.e; PHP people. 
 
 This is utter nonsense.  We're a database, not a desktop.

No. Yes. Obviously. I was not comparing us to a desktop. I was stating
that the people we are trying to reach are user space developers, like
PHP people.


 People who even know what a database is, let alone program one,
 are sufficiently geeky to be aware of the usual conventions for
 software version numbering.  

Can and will are different things. Every barrier that we can lower
without sacrificing the quality of our software, is a barrier that
should be lowered. Period.

If modifying the version numbering scheme helps even an ants inch, we
should do it.

 Or at least to RTFM if they don't.

If this were true, this thread wouldn't be as long as it is, nor would
our mailing lists be anywhere near as busy as they are.

Sincerely,

Joshua D. Drake


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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-21 Thread David Fetter
On Sat, Aug 21, 2010 at 03:34:35AM -, Greg Sabino Mullane wrote:
  It's possible that we're arguing for the sake of arguing
 
 No it's not! ;)

Yes it is! ;)

  It's nice to be able to keep track of the major version number
  without running out of fingers (at least for a few more years) and
  it's nice to be able to bump the major version number when we do
  something to totally destabilize the tree^W^W^W^W^Wreally cool.
  Or at least, I think it's nice.  Again, YMMV, IMHO, etc.
 
  If the Windows port was the primary justification for the 8.0
  designation, and HS/SR are the justification for the 9.0
  designation, what will 10.0 be?
 
 Therein lies the problem: our decision to do a major bump is
 inconsistent at best, and wildy confusing at worst. Does a new
 feature really constitute a major bump? Perhaps so, as with 9.0
 SR/HS, but in that case there have been other times we should have
 bumped the major for some new feature and did not.  What about major
 internal changes and libpq version bumps? You might think those
 would always be a major change, but they are not. We went from 7.2
 to 7.3 without considering how major it is (hello, schemas!). What
 about end-user compatiblity? I sometimes suspect few hackers on this
 list realize how completely disruptive, annoying, and painful the
 removal of implicit casts was in 8.3. That would have been a major
 bump in my book at least.
 
 I think in the future we should consider lowering the bar for a
 major release, as it's better to err on that side.

Disruptive to developers is one sufficient criterion.

Another is does some big thing simply that would have been hard or
impossible before.

Previous things like dblink, schemas and CTEs, and upcoming things
like synchronous replication, SQL/MED, parallel query, and (of course
;) writeable CTEs, would qualify under that second.

Open for discussion would be features like Can spit out, on demand,
any subset of the dependency graph for an object.

Cheers,
David.
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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-21 Thread Greg Stark
On Sat, Aug 21, 2010 at 5:51 PM, Joshua D. Drake j...@commandprompt.com wrote:

 PostgreSQL is a user space project. Yes we have a solid core of -hackers
 but our wider use is a place where hackers don't exist. User space
 developers do. I.e; PHP people.

Uhm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PHP#Release_history

The current release of PHP is 5.3.3 -- ie, the third patch release of
the third regular release of PHP5 -- the fifth major rewrite of the
engine and language.

They use exactly the same model we use and virtually every other
software package every uses unti the marketing department gets ahold
of it and confuses things.


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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-21 Thread Greg Stark
On Sat, Aug 21, 2010 at 6:24 PM, Greg Stark gsst...@mit.edu wrote:
 I'm not sure what you're point is here.

Argh! This thread is almost enough to make me believe in adding
recalls to smtp. I can't even blame this one on my flaky keyboard this
time.

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-21 Thread Joshua D. Drake
On Sat, 2010-08-21 at 18:24 +0100, Greg Stark wrote:
 On Sat, Aug 21, 2010 at 5:51 PM, Joshua D. Drake j...@commandprompt.com 
 wrote:
  There was *NEVER* a Windows NT 4.0.x, there was Windows NT 4.0 SP2.
 
 
 I'm not sure what you're point is here. There was a NT 4.0 followed by
 SP1 through SP6. followed by NT 5.0, 5.1, 5.2, 6.0, 6.1, and 7.0. They
 also had brand names 2000, XP, 2003, Vista, 7, etc -- is this model
 less confusing?

Yeah sorry. I kind of went down a path without completing the thought
process.  

There was no NT 5.0, 5.1 etc... There may have been an internal name, an
engineers name, or heck possibly even if you did help about it would
mention 5.0 (I don't actually know). However, the users never new them
as those. Period. Which is what I am getting at.

Our new and less technical users are confused about whether 8.1 and 8.2
are 8.0 SP1 and 8.0 SP2. Which they clearly aren't.

 
 The whole point here is that there is a pretty broad consensus across
 software projects that the first digit is for major releases that
 change the whole product character -- Linux 2.0, Samba 3.x, Libc 6,

All three of those are irrelevant to this conversation. Users don't run
Linux 2.0. They run Ubuntu, Fedora or SUSE.

I can easily on a weekly basis run into a customer, or external
community user that says, I am running PostgreSQL 8. They will
actually be running, 8.0, 8.1, 8.2, 8.3 or 8.4. Yes, a good number of
more technical, or those who have been in the community longer have
figured it out


Let's make this simple:

Q. Do we have a problem?
A. Some of our contributors, even some very experienced contributors
feel we do.

Q. What is the problem we are trying to solve?
A. That users, especially those that are less technical are confused by
our versioning system.

Q. How do we solve that problem?
A. ...

Q. Does the presented solution create a new problem that must be solved?
A. ...

It would be great everyone would stop arguing semantics (myself
included) and just attempt to solve the problem. 

Education isn't going to cut it, we have been educating for almost 15
years.

Sincerely,

Joshua D. Drake





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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-21 Thread Joshua D. Drake
On Sat, 2010-08-21 at 18:35 +0100, Greg Stark wrote:
 On Sat, Aug 21, 2010 at 6:24 PM, Greg Stark gsst...@mit.edu wrote:
  I'm not sure what you're point is here.
 
 Argh! This thread is almost enough to make me believe in adding
 recalls to smtp. I can't even blame this one on my flaky keyboard this
 time.

Hahahahaha. Yeah I think we are spinning at this point. I posted a
simple, problem we are trying to solve email. If we can do that, great.
If not we are just wasting bandwidth.

Sincerely,

Joshua D. Drake

 

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-21 Thread Greg Stark
On Sat, Aug 21, 2010 at 6:37 PM, Joshua D. Drake j...@commandprompt.com wrote:
 Q. Do we have a problem?
 A. Some of our contributors, even some very experienced contributors
 feel we do.

 Q. What is the problem we are trying to solve?
 A. That users, especially those that are less technical are confused by
 our versioning system.

 Q. How do we solve that problem?
 A. ...

Sorry, but this is all a logical fallacy. There will always be a
percentage of people who are confused. The question is which scheme
results in the least confusion and communicates the most information.

Following industry standard practice is the best way to minimize that
confusion. If we adopt a different scheme then it might be clearer to
beginners but be confusing and unhelpful to everyone else. It'll look
like we're doing a major rewrite every year and there's no way to tell
which releases are major changes and which are just annual releases.

Frankly I think we've been bumping version numbers too often. It's a
consequence of the insane pace of development we've had. Adding PITR
in 8.0 was a pretty major step and hot standby in 9.0 will be big too.
But we should be limiting the first digit for Perl 6 scale changes,
not just features that are really really cool.

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-21 Thread Peter Geoghegan
 Or at least to RTFM if they don't.

 If this were true, this thread wouldn't be as long as it is, nor would
 our mailing lists be anywhere near as busy as they are.

This thread is as long as it is principally because people generally
bikeshed about things that are easy to understand, and are fun to have
an opinion about.

 Frankly I think we've been bumping version numbers too often. It's a
 consequence of the insane pace of development we've had. Adding PITR
 in 8.0 was a pretty major step and hot standby in 9.0 will be big too.
 But we should be limiting the first digit for Perl 6 scale changes,
 not just features that are really really cool.

While I generally agree with your views about versioning conventions,
if we did that, we'd probably never bump the major version number. As
far as I'm aware, Postgres has never had such radical changes in a
single release, that broke compatibility to such an extent. Also,
while we aren't subject to the same commercial pressures as the
proprietary vendors, I don't think that we can afford to not have our
versioning conventions informed by marketing concerns to any extent.
We changed 8.5 to 9.0 explicitly because doing so was good marketing,
and also because of HS/SR (plus we wanted to hint at the fact that 9.0
might not be the most stable release we've had), and I'm inclined to
agree with that.


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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-21 Thread Wolfgang Wilhelm
I don´t have any problem with PostgreSQL version numbering, to the contrary. 
The 
only thing I didn´t like was Postgres95, but I didn´t use Pg then. But since 
then it´s _consistent_ and I really appreciate that. I could live with, say, 
version 9.12.0 in a dozend years. I accept the alpha, beta or RC extensions.

I don´t like the M$ way: Why is WinWord 2 followed by WinWord 7? Why sometimes 
a 
number, then a name like Win98 followed by ME. Marketing? What´s the next idea 
of their marketing departmenr? May be Windows Baobao because the chinese market 
is really important?

I don´t want to compare me or my users with yours. Most of my users know 
exactly 
one thing about the data base: When it´s NOT working. That´s all they care for. 
Working, not numbering. My users are all small and mid size enterprises, with 
less than 150 employees. They are just users and hire me as generalist, as 
developer, administrator, DBA, hot line and the one to cope with their 
inability 
to RTFM in one person. Usually they are satisfied PostgreSQL users without 
knowing what it is or what it does. It´s just - sorry for that - somewhere in 
the background. Like my MTA, which is ehem... duh, have to look for.

Wolfgang



[HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread David E. Wheeler
Hackers,

A while ago, I asked if .0 releases could be versioned with three digits 
instead of two. That is, it would be 8.4.0 instead of 8.4. This is to make 
the format consistent with maintenance releases (8.4.1, etc.). I thought this 
was generally agreed upon, but maybe not, because I just went to build the 
latest 9.0 beta and saw that the version number is 9.0beta4.

Would it be possible to *always* use three integers? So the next release would 
be 9.0.0beta5 or 9.0.0rc1? In addition to being more consistent, it also 
means that PostgreSQL would be adhering to Semantic Versioning 
(http://semver.org/), which is a very simple format that's internally 
consistent. I'm planning to require semantic versioning for PGXN, and it'd be 
nice if the core could do the same thing (it will make it nicer for specifying 
dependencies on core contrib modules, for example).

Thanks,

David
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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread David Fetter
On Fri, Aug 20, 2010 at 11:12:56AM -0700, David Wheeler wrote:
 Hackers,
 
 A while ago, I asked if .0 releases could be versioned with three
 digits instead of two. That is, it would be 8.4.0 instead of
 8.4. This is to make the format consistent with maintenance
 releases (8.4.1, etc.). I thought this was generally agreed upon,
 but maybe not, because I just went to build the latest 9.0 beta and
 saw that the version number is 9.0beta4.
 
 Would it be possible to *always* use three integers? So the next
 release would be 9.0.0beta5 or 9.0.0rc1? In addition to being
 more consistent, it also means that PostgreSQL would be adhering to
 Semantic Versioning (http://semver.org/), which is a very simple
 format that's internally consistent. I'm planning to require
 semantic versioning for PGXN, and it'd be nice if the core could do
 the same thing (it will make it nicer for specifying dependencies on
 core contrib modules, for example).

+1 for three-number versions...well, until we really see the light and
go to two-number versions.  8.3 and 8.4 are different enough that they
shouldn't even mildly appear the same, for example.

Cheers,
David (Oh, how silly!  You actually want Frobozz 3.1.4.1.5.2.6, not 
3.1.4.1.5.2.5!).
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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread David E. Wheeler
On Aug 20, 2010, at 11:34 AM, David Fetter wrote:

 +1 for three-number versions...well, until we really see the light and
 go to two-number versions.  8.3 and 8.4 are different enough that they
 shouldn't even mildly appear the same, for example.

No idea what you mean by that, but generally it's a bad idea to switch from 
dotted-integer version numbers and numeric version numbers. See Perl (Quel 
désastre!).

Best,

David


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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Tom Lane
David E. Wheeler da...@kineticode.com writes:
 A while ago, I asked if .0 releases could be versioned with three
 digits instead of two. That is, it would be 8.4.0 instead of 8.4.

We've been doing that for some time, no?  A quick look at the CVS
history shows that 8.0.0 and up were tagged that way.

 This is to make the format consistent with maintenance releases (8.4.1, 
 etc.). I thought this was generally agreed upon, but maybe not, because I 
 just went to build the latest 9.0 beta and saw that the version number is 
 9.0beta4.

.0 is for releases, not betas.  I see no need for an extra number in
beta versions.

regards, tom lane

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread David E. Wheeler

On Aug 20, 2010, at 11:40 AM, Tom Lane wrote:

 David E. Wheeler da...@kineticode.com writes:
 A while ago, I asked if .0 releases could be versioned with three
 digits instead of two. That is, it would be 8.4.0 instead of 8.4.
 
 We've been doing that for some time, no?  A quick look at the CVS
 history shows that 8.0.0 and up were tagged that way.

Ah, good for the final release.

 This is to make the format consistent with maintenance releases (8.4.1, 
 etc.). I thought this was generally agreed upon, but maybe not, because I 
 just went to build the latest 9.0 beta and saw that the version number is 
 9.0beta4.
 
 .0 is for releases, not betas.  I see no need for an extra number in
 beta versions.

Again, it means the format would be consistent. Always three integers. Nice 
thing about Semantic Versions is that if you append any ASCII string to the 
third integer, it automatically means less than that integer.

Best,

David



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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread David Fetter
On Fri, Aug 20, 2010 at 11:36:55AM -0700, David Wheeler wrote:
 On Aug 20, 2010, at 11:34 AM, David Fetter wrote:
 
  +1 for three-number versions...well, until we really see the light
  and go to two-number versions.  8.3 and 8.4 are different enough
  that they shouldn't even mildly appear the same, for example.
 
 No idea what you mean by that, but generally it's a bad idea to
 switch from dotted-integer version numbers and numeric version
 numbers. See Perl (Quel désastre!).

I'm thinking that after 9.0, the first release of the next major
version should be 10.0, and the one after that, 11.0, etc., etc.

The current system give people the completely false impression that
7.0 and 7.4 are somehow similar.

Cheers,
David.
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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread David E. Wheeler
On Aug 20, 2010, at 11:47 AM, David Fetter wrote:

 No idea what you mean by that, but generally it's a bad idea to
 switch from dotted-integer version numbers and numeric version
 numbers. See Perl (Quel désastre!).
 
 I'm thinking that after 9.0, the first release of the next major
 version should be 10.0, and the one after that, 11.0, etc., etc.

Oh. Good luck with that. I disagree, FWIW.

 The current system give people the completely false impression that
 7.0 and 7.4 are somehow similar.

On what planet?

Best,

David


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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Greg Stark
On Fri, Aug 20, 2010 at 7:34 PM, David Fetter da...@fetter.org wrote:
 +1 for three-number versions...well, until we really see the light and
 go to two-number versions.  8.3 and 8.4 are different enough that they
 shouldn't even mildly appear the same, for example.

You realize if we did that 9.0 would be version 18?

 David (Oh, how silly!  You actually want Frobozz 3.1.4.1.5.2.6, not 
 3.1.4.1.5.2.5!).

So eventually you end up with the same problem. Oh, you wanted version
117 not 116!




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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Greg Stark
On Fri, Aug 20, 2010 at 7:42 PM, David E. Wheeler da...@kineticode.com wrote:
 Again, it means the format would be consistent. Always three integers. Nice 
 thing about Semantic Versions is that if you append any ASCII string to the 
 third integer, it automatically means less than that integer.


So I count three integers in both 9.0rc1 and 9.0beta4


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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread David E. Wheeler
On Aug 20, 2010, at 12:02 PM, Greg Stark wrote:

 Again, it means the format would be consistent. Always three integers. Nice 
 thing about Semantic Versions is that if you append any ASCII string to the 
 third integer, it automatically means less than that integer.
 
 
 So I count three integers in both 9.0rc1 and 9.0beta4

No, I mean 9.0.0beta4. If we were to adopt the Semantic Versioning spec, one 
would *always* use X.Y.Z, with optional ASCII characters appended to Z to add 
meaning (including less than unadorned Z).

Best,

David


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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Tom Lane
David E. Wheeler da...@kineticode.com writes:
 On Aug 20, 2010, at 12:02 PM, Greg Stark wrote:
 So I count three integers in both 9.0rc1 and 9.0beta4

 No, I mean 9.0.0beta4. If we were to adopt the Semantic Versioning spec, one 
 would *always* use X.Y.Z, with optional ASCII characters appended to Z to add 
 meaning (including less than unadorned Z).

Well, I for one will fiercely resist adopting any such standard, because
it's directly opposite to the way that RPM will sort such version numbers.
Apparently whoever wrote Semantic Versioning didn't bother to inquire
into existing practice.

regards, tom lane

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread David E. Wheeler
On Aug 20, 2010, at 12:15 PM, Tom Lane wrote:

 No, I mean 9.0.0beta4. If we were to adopt the Semantic Versioning spec, one 
 would *always* use X.Y.Z, with optional ASCII characters appended to Z to 
 add meaning (including less than unadorned Z).
 
 Well, I for one will fiercely resist adopting any such standard, because
 it's directly opposite to the way that RPM will sort such version numbers.

Which is how?

 Apparently whoever wrote Semantic Versioning didn't bother to inquire
 into existing practice.

Tom Preston-Warner of GitHub fame.

Best,

David


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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Devrim GÜNDÜZ

+1 for Tom's post.

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20.Ağu.2010 tarihinde 21:40 saatinde, Tom Lane t...@sss.pgh.pa.us  
şunları yazdı:



David E. Wheeler da...@kineticode.com writes:

A while ago, I asked if .0 releases could be versioned with three
digits instead of two. That is, it would be 8.4.0 instead of 8.4.


We've been doing that for some time, no?  A quick look at the CVS
history shows that 8.0.0 and up were tagged that way.

This is to make the format consistent with maintenance releases  
(8.4.1, etc.). I thought this was generally agreed upon, but  
maybe not, because I just went to build the latest 9.0 beta and saw  
that the version number is 9.0beta4.


.0 is for releases, not betas.  I see no need for an extra number in
beta versions.

   regards, tom lane

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Devrim GÜNDÜZ
20.Ağu.2010 tarihinde 21:47 saatinde, David Fetter da...@fetter.org  
şunları yazdı:

The current system give people the completely false impression that
7.0 and 7.4 are somehow similar.


Well, I do find PostgreSQL versioning policy very good, which is  
pretty much similar to Linux. For me, 7.x are similar. Remember why we  
jumped from 7.5 to 8.0 or from 8.5 to 9.0.


Cheers,
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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread David E. Wheeler
On Aug 20, 2010, at 12:21 PM, Devrim GÜNDÜZ wrote:

 +1 for Tom's post.
 
 20.Ağu.2010 tarihinde 21:40 saatinde, Tom Lane t...@sss.pgh.pa.us şunları 
 yazdı:
 
 .0 is for releases, not betas.  I see no need for an extra number in
 beta versions.

Yes, well, it's still implicit, isn't it?

David



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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Stephen Frost
* David E. Wheeler (da...@kineticode.com) wrote:
 On Aug 20, 2010, at 12:21 PM, Devrim GÜNDÜZ wrote:
 
  +1 for Tom's post.
  
  20.Ağu.2010 tarihinde 21:40 saatinde, Tom Lane t...@sss.pgh.pa.us şunları 
  yazdı:
  
  .0 is for releases, not betas.  I see no need for an extra number in
  beta versions.
 
 Yes, well, it's still implicit, isn't it?

It's still useless garbage..  Sorry, I'm w/ Tom on this one.

THanks,

Stephen


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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Kevin Grittner
David E. Wheeler da...@kineticode.com wrote:
 
 .0 is for releases, not betas.  I see no need for an extra
 number in beta versions.
 
 Yes, well, it's still implicit, isn't it?
 
Not the way I read it.  If we had a development cycle which resulted
in 8.4.5beta4, then you would have a point.  We don't.
 
Now, if you wanted to argue that it would be better to use 9.0.beta4
than 9.0beta4, that might be defensible.  I think I like that
better; but I'm not inclined to think the difference is worth the
pain of changing an established convention.
 
-Kevin

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Josh Berkus

 Yes, well, it's still implicit, isn't it?

But the last .0 in 9.0.0 is the patch level, effectively.  This makes
that .0 inappropriate for betas; the beta number is the patch level,
i.e. 9.0.beta4.  It doesn't make any sense to have a 9.0.0beta4, since
we're never going to have a 9.0.2beta4.

The betas are pre-.0.  Maybe we should have 9.0.(-3) instead. Or 8.9.97?
 ;-)

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Devrim GÜNDÜZ


20.Ağu.2010 tarihinde 23:03 saatinde, Josh Berkus j...@agliodbs.com  
şunları yazdı:


The betas are pre-.0.  Maybe we should have 9.0.(-3) instead. Or  
8.9.97?

;-)


This is pretty much what Fedora does actually :-)

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread David Fetter
On Fri, Aug 20, 2010 at 07:59:55PM +0100, Greg Stark wrote:
 On Fri, Aug 20, 2010 at 7:34 PM, David Fetter da...@fetter.org wrote:
  +1 for three-number versions...well, until we really see the light
  and go to two-number versions.  8.3 and 8.4 are different enough
  that they shouldn't even mildly appear the same, for example.
 
 You realize if we did that 9.0 would be version 18?

Yes.  And?

  David (Oh, how silly!  You actually want Frobozz 3.1.4.1.5.2.6,
  not 3.1.4.1.5.2.5!).
 
 So eventually you end up with the same problem. Oh, you wanted
 version 117 not 116!

Assuming wild optimism, namely that we release a major version each
year on the exact same date, that will become a problem *long* after
no one in this discussion is still involved with the project.  I'm OK
with deferring this to future generations.

Cheers,
David.
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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread David Fetter
On Fri, Aug 20, 2010 at 11:48:12AM -0700, David Wheeler wrote:
 On Aug 20, 2010, at 11:47 AM, David Fetter wrote:
 
  No idea what you mean by that, but generally it's a bad idea to
  switch from dotted-integer version numbers and numeric version
  numbers. See Perl (Quel désastre!).
  
  I'm thinking that after 9.0, the first release of the next major
  version should be 10.0, and the one after that, 11.0, etc., etc.
 
 Oh. Good luck with that. I disagree, FWIW.
 
  The current system give people the completely false impression
  that 7.0 and 7.4 are somehow similar.
 
 On what planet?

We're using Postgre 8

See also all the flocks of tools that claim to support Postgres 8

Cheers,
David.
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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Tom Lane
David E. Wheeler da...@kineticode.com writes:
 On Aug 20, 2010, at 12:15 PM, Tom Lane wrote:
 Well, I for one will fiercely resist adopting any such standard, because
 it's directly opposite to the way that RPM will sort such version numbers.

 Which is how?

9.0.0 is less than 9.0.0anything.  Unless you wire some specific
knowledge of semantics of particular letter-strings into the comparison
algorithm, it's difficult to come to another decision, IMO.

BTW, 9.0.0 is also less than 9.0.0.anything ... so sticking another dot
in there wouldn't help.

regards, tom lane

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Greg Sabino Mullane

-BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-
Hash: RIPEMD160

David Wheeler:

 No idea what you mean by that, but generally it's a bad idea 
 to switch from dotted-integer version numbers and numeric 
 version numbers. See Perl (Quel dsastre!).

Yeah, I think Perl is a prime example of how NOT to handle 
version numbering. :) I think we got it right the first time.

David Fetter:

 We're using Postgre 8

 See also all the flocks of tools that claim to support Postgres 8

Flocks? Handful at best, and no reason we should be catering to 
their inaccuracies.

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PGP Key: 0x14964AC8 201008201713
http://biglumber.com/x/web?pk=2529DF6AB8F79407E94445B4BC9B906714964AC8
-BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-

iEYEAREDAAYFAkxu8NkACgkQvJuQZxSWSsgNVACfYko/YC7SOlMXpavO7JXWSZhp
i7QAoKmPKvNlASLAYfimtnrpg0lk82vh
=aWSL
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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Aidan Van Dyk
* Tom Lane t...@sss.pgh.pa.us [100820 17:10]:
 
 BTW, 9.0.0 is also less than 9.0.0.anything ... so sticking another dot
 in there wouldn't help.

Debian's packaging versions work around this with the special ~
character, which they define as sorting *before* nothing, meaning
8.4~beta1  8.4  8.4.0  8.4extra

See the deb-version man page for details, a nice convinenct, but yes, a
special cased rule...

But at least it's wildly used ;-)

a.

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Joshua D. Drake
On Fri, 2010-08-20 at 21:17 +, Greg Sabino Mullane wrote:

 David Fetter:
 
  We're using Postgre 8
 
  See also all the flocks of tools that claim to support Postgres 8
 
 Flocks? Handful at best, and no reason we should be catering to 
 their inaccuracies.

Depends on the goal. If our goal is to continue to add confusion to the
masses of users we have, you are correct. If our goal is to simplify the
ability for a user to accurately understand the version of PostgreSQL
they are running, then you are wrong.

Joshua D. Drake


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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread David E. Wheeler
On Aug 20, 2010, at 2:10 PM, Tom Lane wrote:

 9.0.0 is less than 9.0.0anything.  Unless you wire some specific
 knowledge of semantics of particular letter-strings into the comparison
 algorithm, it's difficult to come to another decision, IMO.

That's what Semantic versions do. From the spec's #3:

 A special version number MAY be denoted by appending an arbitrary string 
 immediately following the patch version. The string MUST be comprised of only 
 alphanumerics plus dash [0-9A-Za-z-] and MUST begin with an alpha character 
 [A-Za-z]. Special versions satisfy but have a lower precedence than the 
 associated normal version. Precedence SHOULD be determined by lexicographic 
 ASCII sort order. For instance: 1.0.0beta1  1.0.0beta2  1.0.0.

I'm comfortable with this because it's consistent with what people expect when 
they read a version number.

Best,

David
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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Jaime Casanova
On Fri, Aug 20, 2010 at 1:48 PM, David E. Wheeler da...@kineticode.com wrote:
 On Aug 20, 2010, at 11:47 AM, David Fetter wrote:

 The current system give people the completely false impression that
 7.0 and 7.4 are somehow similar.

 On what planet?


Look at other DBMSes:
Oracle: 8i, 9i, 10g, 11g
Informix 9, 10, 11
MS SQL Server 7, 2000, 2005, 2008

note the lack of dotes (and even if they actually have dots, those are
minor versions).

is not only confusing but make people think we are somehow behind the
others... someone actually told me that Oracle is in version 11 we
only in version 8 so Oracle should have more features...
no that i follow that reasoning but...

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread David Fetter
On Fri, Aug 20, 2010 at 04:41:20PM -0500, Jaime Casanova wrote:
 On Fri, Aug 20, 2010 at 1:48 PM, David E. Wheeler da...@kineticode.com 
 wrote:
  On Aug 20, 2010, at 11:47 AM, David Fetter wrote:
 
  The current system give people the completely false impression
  that 7.0 and 7.4 are somehow similar.
 
  On what planet?
 
 Look at other DBMSes:
 Oracle: 8i, 9i, 10g, 11g
 Informix 9, 10, 11
 MS SQL Server 7, 2000, 2005, 2008
 
 note the lack of dotes (and even if they actually have dots, those
 are minor versions).

Some people dote on dots.

 is not only confusing but make people think we are somehow behind
 the others... someone actually told me that Oracle is in version 11
 we only in version 8 so Oracle should have more features...  no that
 i follow that reasoning but...

This one goes up to 11! ;)

Cheers,
David.
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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Greg Stark
On Fri, Aug 20, 2010 at 10:41 PM, Jaime Casanova ja...@2ndquadrant.com wrote:
 Look at other DBMSes:
 Oracle: 8i, 9i, 10g, 11g
 Informix 9, 10, 11
 MS SQL Server 7, 2000, 2005, 2008

 note the lack of dotes (and even if they actually have dots, those are
 minor versions).


So your proposal is that we name the next release of Postres 9i?

I don't think looking at some of the most industry worst practices
driven by marketing goals unconnected with the product features is
going to help us in any way.

In any case those are all marketing brand names. The actual releases
do in fact have real version numbers and no, they aren't all minor
releases. Oracle 8i was 8.1.x which was indeed a major release over
8.0.



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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Jaime Casanova
On Fri, Aug 20, 2010 at 4:48 PM, Greg Stark gsst...@mit.edu wrote:
 On Fri, Aug 20, 2010 at 10:41 PM, Jaime Casanova ja...@2ndquadrant.com 
 wrote:
 Look at other DBMSes:
 Oracle: 8i, 9i, 10g, 11g
 Informix 9, 10, 11
 MS SQL Server 7, 2000, 2005, 2008

 note the lack of dotes (and even if they actually have dots, those are
 minor versions).


 So your proposal is that we name the next release of Postres 9i?


well, i'm not proposing anything... just showing that our numbering
scheme *is* confusing


 In any case those are all marketing brand names. The actual releases
 do in fact have real version numbers and no, they aren't all minor
 releases. Oracle 8i was 8.1.x which was indeed a major release over
 8.0.


Maybe we can give marketing brand names to every new version so people
is not confused by numbers...

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Greg Stark
On Fri, Aug 20, 2010 at 10:55 PM, Jaime Casanova ja...@2ndquadrant.com wrote:
 In any case those are all marketing brand names. The actual releases
 do in fact have real version numbers and no, they aren't all minor
 releases. Oracle 8i was 8.1.x which was indeed a major release over
 8.0.


 Maybe we can give marketing brand names to every new version so people
 is not confused by numbers...

I can't tell whether you're being sarcastic or not. The whole point of
those marketing names *is* to confuse users.




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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Robert Haas
On Aug 20, 2010, at 5:55 PM, Jaime Casanova ja...@2ndquadrant.com wrote:
 On Fri, Aug 20, 2010 at 4:48 PM, Greg Stark gsst...@mit.edu wrote:
 On Fri, Aug 20, 2010 at 10:41 PM, Jaime Casanova ja...@2ndquadrant.com 
 wrote:
 Look at other DBMSes:
 Oracle: 8i, 9i, 10g, 11g
 Informix 9, 10, 11
 MS SQL Server 7, 2000, 2005, 2008
 
 note the lack of dotes (and even if they actually have dots, those are
 minor versions).
 
 
 So your proposal is that we name the next release of Postres 9i?
 
 
 well, i'm not proposing anything... just showing that our numbering
 scheme *is* confusing
 
 
 In any case those are all marketing brand names. The actual releases
 do in fact have real version numbers and no, they aren't all minor
 releases. Oracle 8i was 8.1.x which was indeed a major release over
 8.0.
 
 
 Maybe we can give marketing brand names to every new version so people
 is not confused by numbers...

Ah, yes. Because it's so intuitive that Windows 7 comes after Windows 95... :-)

...Robert
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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Thom Brown
On 20 August 2010 23:10, Robert Haas robertmh...@gmail.com wrote:
 On Aug 20, 2010, at 5:55 PM, Jaime Casanova ja...@2ndquadrant.com wrote:
 On Fri, Aug 20, 2010 at 4:48 PM, Greg Stark gsst...@mit.edu wrote:
 On Fri, Aug 20, 2010 at 10:41 PM, Jaime Casanova ja...@2ndquadrant.com 
 wrote:
 Look at other DBMSes:
 Oracle: 8i, 9i, 10g, 11g
 Informix 9, 10, 11
 MS SQL Server 7, 2000, 2005, 2008

 note the lack of dotes (and even if they actually have dots, those are
 minor versions).


 So your proposal is that we name the next release of Postres 9i?


 well, i'm not proposing anything... just showing that our numbering
 scheme *is* confusing


 In any case those are all marketing brand names. The actual releases
 do in fact have real version numbers and no, they aren't all minor
 releases. Oracle 8i was 8.1.x which was indeed a major release over
 8.0.


 Maybe we can give marketing brand names to every new version so people
 is not confused by numbers...

 Ah, yes. Because it's so intuitive that Windows 7 comes after Windows 95... 
 :-)

 ...Robert

A colleague of mine wrote this which might be of interest, and it
mentions both Windows and PostgreSQL:
http://rwec.co.uk/blog/2010/02/golden-rules-of-version-naming/

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Joshua D. Drake
On Fri, 2010-08-20 at 18:10 -0400, Robert Haas wrote:
  
  
  Maybe we can give marketing brand names to every new version so people
  is not confused by numbers...
 
 Ah, yes. Because it's so intuitive that Windows 7 comes after Windows 95... 
 :-)

Not really a comparable argument. I find it interesting that people are
making logical arguments about something that is clearly not in the
logical realm. This is marketing people. 

Windows 7 works because it is  than Windows Vista. It sounds, looks and
feels greater. It also certainly doesn't hurt that they have billions
for marketing.

JD


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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Josh Berkus

 Not really a comparable argument. I find it interesting that people are
 making logical arguments about something that is clearly not in the
 logical realm. This is marketing people. 

Then why are we discussing it on -hackers?

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Joshua D. Drake
On Fri, 2010-08-20 at 15:41 -0700, Josh Berkus wrote:
  Not really a comparable argument. I find it interesting that people are
  making logical arguments about something that is clearly not in the
  logical realm. This is marketing people. 
 
 Then why are we discussing it on -hackers?

Good point :D

 
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  http://www.pgexperts.com
 

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Greg Sabino Mullane

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 Then why are we discussing it on -hackers?

Because you will need buy in from the hackers if you 
ever want to do something as radical as change to 
a two-number, one dot system (or some the slightly 
less radical earlier suggestions). For the record, 
I'm with Tom on this: -1 to any changes.

I do like the Ubuntu/Debian way of naming the releases 
with some sort of non-numeric name though. :)

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Greg Sabino Mullane

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 Flocks? Handful at best, and no reason we should be catering to 
 their inaccuracies.

 Depends on the goal. If our goal is to continue to add confusion to the
 masses of users we have, you are correct. If our goal is to simplify the
 ability for a user to accurately understand the version of PostgreSQL
 they are running, then you are wrong.

Are we adding confusion? Do you have any proof to back up that assertion? 
I'm pretty sure the masses can handle the fact that 9.1.x is going to 
come after 9.0.x, and that 9.0.1 is an bug fix for 9.0.0.

True, we don't always have the best track record for bumping major 
releases. (ponders) Hmmm...I'm rethinking my immediate rejection of the 
idea now. 7.3 to 7.4 should have been 7.3 to 8.0. Certainly it was more 
major than 8.0 to 8.1 was, for example. Consider me a very weak -1 
and open to persuasion. :)

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Greg Sabino Mullane

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 Look at other DBMSes:
 Oracle: 8i, 9i, 10g, 11g
 Informix 9, 10, 11
 MS SQL Server 7, 2000, 2005, 2008

 is not only confusing but make people think we are somehow behind the
 others... someone actually told me that Oracle is in version 11 we
 only in version 8 so Oracle should have more features...
 no that i follow that reasoning but...

Well by that reasoning SQL Server 2008 is a quantum leap ahead of Oracle!

Frankly, that 'someone' should be hit hard with a clue stick and be 
forced to keep 50 feet away from all computers.

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Joshua D. Drake
On Sat, 2010-08-21 at 01:31 +, Greg Sabino Mullane wrote:
 -BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-
 Hash: RIPEMD160
 
 
  Flocks? Handful at best, and no reason we should be catering to 
  their inaccuracies.
 
  Depends on the goal. If our goal is to continue to add confusion to the
  masses of users we have, you are correct. If our goal is to simplify the
  ability for a user to accurately understand the version of PostgreSQL
  they are running, then you are wrong.
 
 Are we adding confusion? Do you have any proof to back up that assertion? 
 I'm pretty sure the masses can handle the fact that 9.1.x is going to 
 come after 9.0.x, and that 9.0.1 is an bug fix for 9.0.0.

As I said previously. I am constantly educated new and old customers on
proper versioning. I *know* I am not the only one that has this problem.

 True, we don't always have the best track record for bumping major 
 releases. (ponders) Hmmm...I'm rethinking my immediate rejection of the 
 idea now. 7.3 to 7.4 should have been 7.3 to 8.0. Certainly it was more 
 major than 8.0 to 8.1 was, for example. Consider me a very weak -1 
 and open to persuasion. :)

Are we losing something by going to a notably simpler scheme of
versioning? Is there a problem we are creating? Are we arguing for the
sake of arguing?

Sincerely,

Joshua D. Drake


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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Joshua D. Drake
On Sat, 2010-08-21 at 01:36 +, Greg Sabino Mullane wrote:
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  Look at other DBMSes:
  Oracle: 8i, 9i, 10g, 11g
  Informix 9, 10, 11
  MS SQL Server 7, 2000, 2005, 2008
 
  is not only confusing but make people think we are somehow behind the
  others... someone actually told me that Oracle is in version 11 we
  only in version 8 so Oracle should have more features...
  no that i follow that reasoning but...
 
 Well by that reasoning SQL Server 2008 is a quantum leap ahead of Oracle!

Do we really want to have that argument :P

JD
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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread David E. Wheeler
On Aug 20, 2010, at 5:38 PM, Greg Sabino Mullane wrote:

 Then why are we discussing it on -hackers?
 
 Because you will need buy in from the hackers if you 
 ever want to do something as radical as change to 
 a two-number, one dot system (or some the slightly 
 less radical earlier suggestions). For the record, 
 I'm with Tom on this: -1 to any changes.

It's already a three-integer system for non-dev/alpha/rc releases. So I think 
it's fine the way it is (and easy enough to convert to semantic versions for 
comparative purposes, if necessary).

So: WORMS: Back in the can!

Best,

David


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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Robert Haas
On Fri, Aug 20, 2010 at 2:12 PM, David E. Wheeler da...@kineticode.com wrote:
 Would it be possible to *always* use three integers? So the next release 
 would be 9.0.0beta5 or 9.0.0rc1? In addition to being more consistent, it 
 also means that PostgreSQL would be adhering to Semantic Versioning 
 (http://semver.org/), which is a very simple format that's internally 
 consistent. I'm planning to require semantic versioning for PGXN, and it'd be 
 nice if the core could do the same thing (it will make it nicer for 
 specifying dependencies on core contrib modules, for example).

One thing that may be worth noting here is that even if we implemented
this policy (and the consensus seems to be against it at the moment),
we wouldn't be in compliance with semantic versioning, because our use
of the first two components of the version number does not match that
specification, and we aren't likely to make them match in the future.

What that would mean is that certain kinds of changes would FORCE us
to bump the major revision, and by historical precedent, pretty much
every release cycle would have some.  I've occasionally thought that
it would be interesting to have something in between point releases
and major releases, where, perhaps, we would implement changes that
are more than what we'd allow for a minor version bump but nothing too
invasive; and then use major releases for the real big stuff.  But the
problem with this is that it would greatly complicate development and
testing and I think in the end we'd end up with a less reliable
product and a lot more arguing about which branches things went into.
I think the semantic versioning approach makes sense for libraries,
but it is not too clear to me that it makes sense for other kinds of
applications.  YMMV, of course.

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread David E. Wheeler
On Aug 20, 2010, at 7:49 PM, Robert Haas wrote:

 I think the semantic versioning approach makes sense for libraries,
 but it is not too clear to me that it makes sense for other kinds of
 applications.  YMMV, of course.

Yeah, I'm more concerned about determining dependencies in extensions and core 
than I am why the various parts of version numbers are incremented.

Best,

David



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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Robert Haas
On Fri, Aug 20, 2010 at 10:43 PM, Joshua D. Drake j...@commandprompt.com 
wrote:
 True, we don't always have the best track record for bumping major
 releases. (ponders) Hmmm...I'm rethinking my immediate rejection of the
 idea now. 7.3 to 7.4 should have been 7.3 to 8.0. Certainly it was more
 major than 8.0 to 8.1 was, for example. Consider me a very weak -1
 and open to persuasion. :)

 Are we losing something by going to a notably simpler scheme of
 versioning? Is there a problem we are creating? Are we arguing for the
 sake of arguing?

It's possible that we're arguing for the sake of arguing, but it's so
much easier to have an opinion on version numbering than to have an
opinion on how to fix dependency problems in parallel restore.  So
maybe we're all just letting off some steam.

With respect to simplifying the version numbering schema, I kind of
like the one we have, nonwithstanding the problems it creates (namely,
that people think 8.3.0 to 8.4.0 is a smaller change than it really
is; for some reason, they also tend to think 8.4.0 to 8.4.1 is a
bigger change than it really is; and of course they also think that
8.1.0 to 8.2.0 is the same size change as 8.2.0 to 8.3.0, which isn't
true either).  It's nice to be able to keep track of the major version
number without running out of fingers (at least for a few more years)
and it's nice to be able to bump the major version number when we do
something to totally destabilize the tree^W^W^W^W^Wreally cool.  Or at
least, I think it's nice.  Again, YMMV, IMHO, etc.

If the Windows port was the primary justification for the 8.0
designation, and HS/SR are the justification for the 9.0 designation,
what will 10.0 be?

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering

2010-08-20 Thread Greg Sabino Mullane

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 It's possible that we're arguing for the sake of arguing

No it's not! ;)

  It's nice to be able to keep track of the major version
 number without running out of fingers (at least for a few more years)
 and it's nice to be able to bump the major version number when we do
 something to totally destabilize the tree^W^W^W^W^Wreally cool.  Or at
 least, I think it's nice.  Again, YMMV, IMHO, etc.

 If the Windows port was the primary justification for the 8.0
 designation, and HS/SR are the justification for the 9.0 designation,
 what will 10.0 be?

Therein lies the problem: our decision to do a major bump is inconsistent 
at best, and wildy confusing at worst. Does a new feature really constitute 
a major bump? Perhaps so, as with 9.0 SR/HS, but in that case there have been 
other times we should have bumped the major for some new feature and did not. 
What about major internal changes and libpq version bumps? You might think 
those would always be a major change, but they are not. We went from 7.2 
to 7.3 without considering how major it is (hello, schemas!). What about 
end-user compatiblity? I sometimes suspect few hackers on this list realize how 
completely disruptive, annoying, and painful the removal of implicit 
casts was in 8.3. That would have been a major bump in my book at least.

I think in the future we should consider lowering the bar for a major 
release, as it's better to err on that side.

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering -- The great debate

2004-08-01 Thread Hans-Jürgen Schönig
Joshua D. Drake wrote:
Hello,
Version 7.5 is as close to a major release as I have seen in the almost 
9 years I have been using PostgreSQL.
This release brings about a lot of enterprise features that have been 
holding back PostgreSQL in a big way for
for a long time.

All of my serious customers; potential, existing and past has all at one 
point or another requested most if not
all of the features being released onto the world with 7.5. In fact the 
only ones that I can think of off the top
of my head that isn't in the current list of availables is table 
partitioning and to a lesser extent two phase commit.

This release definately deserves a major version jump. If it were up to 
me it would be more than one (I would
call it 10h for obvious reasons. O.k. the h is a joke but I am serious 
about the 10) just from a marketing
standpoint. I could argue a major version jump just from the fact that 
we finally have a port to the most used
operating system (regardless if that is good or bad) in the world.

Sincerely,
Joshua D. Drake
They have tried to do the same for With Naked Gun (I think it is 
called in English). They called the second film With Naked Gun 2 1/2. 
The third version was called 33 1/3 then ...
Maybe the tenth film would be 10^256 then ...

8.0 would be ok but I am pretty against jumping version number - they 
have such a pure marketing flavour (we have a high version number but 
we don't know what else we should tell you about the new release). 
Database work should be conservative which means slowly but surely ... 
- from my point of view this conflicts with pumping version numbers. I 
don't think there will be one more user just because of a different 
version number.

Maybe a hostily overtake of Oracle (not Firebird as mentioned by Peter) 
would justify 10.0.0 ;).

Regards,
Hans
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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering -- The great debate

2004-08-01 Thread Gaetano Mendola
Peter Eisentraut wrote:
Alvaro Herrera wrote:
What was the rule for increasing the first number after just before
7.0?

That was just to avoid having to release a 6.6.6, which Jan had clearly 
been working towards. :-)

Seriously, major version jumps correspond to epoch-like changes, like 
when the code moved out of Berkeley, or when we switched from bug 
fixing to adding features.  Maybe the next epoch would be after a 
hostile takeover of firebird.  But right now I see no epoch change, 
just a potential for confusing users.  Consistency and humbleness can 
be a virtue.
Have a win32 native implementation is not a epoch change about you ?
Regards
Gaetano Mendola


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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering -- The great debate

2004-08-01 Thread Bruno Wolff III
On Sat, Jul 31, 2004 at 22:40:52 -0700,
  Steve Atkins [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
 
 8.0.0 suggests, to my customers at least, a brand new release with
 either massive re-architecting, many new features or both and that's
 likely to be riddled with bugs. While it would be unlikely that we'd
 ship 7.5.0 to customers (I suspect there'd be a .1 release before we
 were comfortable with the .0 release, given the massive changes)
 there's not a chance we'd ship 8.0.0 - even though it's the identical
 codebase - because of that perception. Probably not 8.0.1 either.

I think that using 8.0.0 will be a good way to warn people that this
version needs to be handled more carefully than previous versions
because of the breadth of the changes.

However, there was also a previous version discussion that had to do
with being able to upgrades without dumps and using the first number
to indicate when a dump and reload was needed. When the second number
changed there was supposed to be a process that could do the necessary
changes without forcing a dump and reload.

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering -- The great debate

2004-08-01 Thread Marc G. Fournier
On Sun, 1 Aug 2004, Peter Eisentraut wrote:
Alvaro Herrera wrote:
What was the rule for increasing the first number after just before
7.0?
That was just to avoid having to release a 6.6.6, which Jan had clearly
been working towards. :-)
Seriously, major version jumps correspond to epoch-like changes, like
when the code moved out of Berkeley, or when we switched from bug
fixing to adding features.  Maybe the next epoch would be after a
hostile takeover of firebird.  But right now I see no epoch change,
just a potential for confusing users.  Consistency and humbleness can
be a virtue.
Okay, just to pop in here ...
I agree with Peter (re: features) ... but, I do think that this release 
could be said to have an 'epoch-like' change ... we now support Windows 
natively.  Up until now, we've been a *Unix* database (I don't care if 
that Unix happens to be Solaris, Linux or SCO ... its all *Unix*) ...

Based on that (and that alone), I'd argue for an 8.0 release ...

Marc G. Fournier   Hub.Org Networking Services (http://www.hub.org)
Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]   Yahoo!: yscrappy  ICQ: 7615664
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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering -- The great debate

2004-08-01 Thread Josh Berkus
Peter,

 Eventually we'll do the Sun switcheroo and follow release 7.12 by 13.0.

Even better, we can have two different, parallel version numbers, so that the 
next version can be 7.5 *and* 13.0.

-- 
Josh Berkus
Aglio Database Solutions
San Francisco

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering -- The great debate

2004-08-01 Thread Christopher Browne
After takin a swig o' Arrakan spice grog, Gaetano Mendola [EMAIL PROTECTED] belched 
out:
 Peter Eisentraut wrote:

 Alvaro Herrera wrote:

What was the rule for increasing the first number after just before
7.0?
 That was just to avoid having to release a 6.6.6, which Jan had
 clearly been working towards. :-)
 Seriously, major version jumps correspond to epoch-like changes,
 like when the code moved out of Berkeley, or when we switched from
 bug fixing to adding features.  Maybe the next epoch would be after
 a hostile takeover of firebird.  But right now I see no epoch
 change, just a potential for confusing users.  Consistency and
 humbleness can be a virtue.

 Have a win32 native implementation is not a epoch change about you ?

I saw mention in the thread that the shift to 7.0 took place when
people realized that 6.5 should have been 7.0.

I think that the set of new features here will fairly likely warrant
the 8.0 moniker; the 'consistent' way to go would be to call this
version 7.5, and then 8.0 would soon follow, and be the release where
some degree of improved maturity has been achieved for:

 a) Win32 support

 b) Nested transactions (thereby leading to the ability to have
exception handling support in stored procedures)

 c) PITR.

It would be surprising for these to all be _completely_ ready for all
purposes come 7.5.0.

The reasonable thing might be to say Forget 7.5.1; call it 8.0!
-- 
let name=cbbrowne and tld=cbbrowne.com in name ^ @ ^ tld;;
http://cbbrowne.com/info/linuxdistributions.html
Computers  in the future  may weigh  no more  than 1.5  tons. -Popular
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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering -- The great debate

2004-08-01 Thread Gaetano Mendola
Christopher Browne wrote:
After takin a swig o' Arrakan spice grog, Gaetano Mendola [EMAIL PROTECTED] belched 
out:
Peter Eisentraut wrote:

Alvaro Herrera wrote:

What was the rule for increasing the first number after just before
7.0?
That was just to avoid having to release a 6.6.6, which Jan had
clearly been working towards. :-)
Seriously, major version jumps correspond to epoch-like changes,
like when the code moved out of Berkeley, or when we switched from
bug fixing to adding features.  Maybe the next epoch would be after
a hostile takeover of firebird.  But right now I see no epoch
change, just a potential for confusing users.  Consistency and
humbleness can be a virtue.
Have a win32 native implementation is not a epoch change about you ?

I saw mention in the thread that the shift to 7.0 took place when
people realized that 6.5 should have been 7.0.
I think that the set of new features here will fairly likely warrant
the 8.0 moniker; the 'consistent' way to go would be to call this
version 7.5, and then 8.0 would soon follow, and be the release where
some degree of improved maturity has been achieved for:
 a) Win32 support
 b) Nested transactions (thereby leading to the ability to have
exception handling support in stored procedures)
 c) PITR.
It would be surprising for these to all be _completely_ ready for all
purposes come 7.5.0.
The reasonable thing might be to say Forget 7.5.1; call it 8.0!

Instead I think is good release a 8.0 in order to underline that this could
be more buggy then a very stable 7.x series.
Regards
Gaetano Mendola
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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering -- The great debate

2004-08-01 Thread Tom Lane
Christopher Browne [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
 I think that the set of new features here will fairly likely warrant
 the 8.0 moniker; the 'consistent' way to go would be to call this
 version 7.5, and then 8.0 would soon follow, and be the release where
 some degree of improved maturity has been achieved for:

Huh?  That is exactly counter to most people's expectations about
version numbering.  N.0 is the unstable release, N.1 is the one
with some bugs shaken out.  If we release a 7.5 people will expect
it to be less buggy than 7.4, and I'm not sure we can promise that.

regards, tom lane

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering -- The great debate

2004-08-01 Thread Doug McNaught
Tom Lane [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:

 Huh?  That is exactly counter to most people's expectations about
 version numbering.  N.0 is the unstable release, N.1 is the one
 with some bugs shaken out.  If we release a 7.5 people will expect
 it to be less buggy than 7.4, and I'm not sure we can promise that.

I agree with this, and from my non-authoritative viewpoint as a user
and rabid advocate, I think we should be going with 8.0 for this
release as well.  :)

-Doug
-- 
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   --T. J. Jackson, 1863

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[HACKERS] Version Numbering -- The great debate

2004-07-31 Thread Josh Berkus
Folks,

Well, we're past feature freeze and with one reservation we know what's in the 
next version.   After talking to several people at OSCON, I want to revive a 
discussion:  whether this is 7.5 or 8.0.  We tabled that discussion in April 
pending a feature list.

Even if Savepoints don't make it, we'll still have:

Win32 Port
LRU/Background Writer/Lazy Vacuum
PITR
Tablespaces
AutoVacuum in backend
$$dollar_quoting$$
Re-typing columns
New PL/perl
CSV import/export

This is more features worth mentioning than we've ever had in a single release 
before -- and if you consider several add-ons which have been 
implemented/improved at the same time (Slony, PL/Java, etc.) it's even more 
momentous.   If this isn't 8.0, then what will be?   

I talked to a few of our people at OSCON who agreed with me.   We'd need to 
settle this before we officially enter beta.   Responses?

-- 
Josh Berkus
Aglio Database Solutions
San Francisco

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering -- The great debate

2004-07-31 Thread Peter Eisentraut
Josh Berkus wrote:
 This is more features worth mentioning than we've ever had in a
 single release before

We've also never had a single release before that had its version number 
jump determined by the number of features.

 I talked to a few of our people at OSCON who agreed with me.   We'd
 need to settle this before we officially enter beta.   Responses?

Considering that beta starts in about 3 hours -- 7.5 it is.

-- 
Peter Eisentraut
http://developer.postgresql.org/~petere/


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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering -- The great debate

2004-07-31 Thread Josh Berkus
Peter,

 We've also never had a single release before that had its version number
 jump determined by the number of features.

That's a non-argument, Peter; we don't have any clear criteria for version 
number jump.

-- 
Josh Berkus
Aglio Database Solutions
San Francisco

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering -- The great debate

2004-07-31 Thread Peter Eisentraut
Josh Berkus wrote:
  We've also never had a single release before that had its version
  number jump determined by the number of features.

 That's a non-argument, Peter; we don't have any clear criteria for
 version number jump.

Oh yes, we have very clear criteria: For patch releases, we increase the 
third number, for feature releases we increase the second number and 
set the third number to zero.  Clear enough?

-- 
Peter Eisentraut
http://developer.postgresql.org/~petere/


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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering -- The great debate

2004-07-31 Thread Josh Berkus
Peter,

 Oh yes, we have very clear criteria: For patch releases, we increase the
 third number, for feature releases we increase the second number and
 set the third number to zero.  Clear enough?

So, as far as you're concerned, there will never ever be an 8.0.

-- 
Josh Berkus
Aglio Database Solutions
San Francisco

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering -- The great debate

2004-07-31 Thread Alvaro Herrera
On Sun, Aug 01, 2004 at 12:02:47AM +0200, Peter Eisentraut wrote:
 Josh Berkus wrote:
   We've also never had a single release before that had its version
   number jump determined by the number of features.
 
  That's a non-argument, Peter; we don't have any clear criteria for
  version number jump.
 
 Oh yes, we have very clear criteria: For patch releases, we increase the 
 third number, for feature releases we increase the second number and 
 set the third number to zero.  Clear enough?

What was the rule for increasing the first number after just before 7.0?

-- 
Alvaro Herrera ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
Vivir y dejar de vivir son soluciones imaginarias.
La existencia está en otra parte (Andre Breton)

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering -- The great debate

2004-07-31 Thread Peter Eisentraut
Josh Berkus wrote:
 So, as far as you're concerned, there will never ever be an 8.0.

Eventually we'll do the Sun switcheroo and follow release 7.12 by 13.0.

-- 
Peter Eisentraut
http://developer.postgresql.org/~petere/


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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering -- The great debate

2004-07-31 Thread Peter Eisentraut
Alvaro Herrera wrote:
 What was the rule for increasing the first number after just before
 7.0?

That was just to avoid having to release a 6.6.6, which Jan had clearly 
been working towards. :-)

Seriously, major version jumps correspond to epoch-like changes, like 
when the code moved out of Berkeley, or when we switched from bug 
fixing to adding features.  Maybe the next epoch would be after a 
hostile takeover of firebird.  But right now I see no epoch change, 
just a potential for confusing users.  Consistency and humbleness can 
be a virtue.

-- 
Peter Eisentraut
http://developer.postgresql.org/~petere/


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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering -- The great debate

2004-07-31 Thread Tom Lane
Josh Berkus [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
 Even if Savepoints don't make it, we'll still have:

Savepoints are in, as is exception-trapping in functions (at least
plpgsql, the other PLs are on their own :-().

Some other major improvements you didn't mention:

Cross-datatype comparisons are indexable (at least for common
combinations); this solves a huge performance gotcha

Dependency-aware pg_dump

Much more complete support for rowtype operations


 This is more features worth mentioning than we've ever had in a single release 
 before -- and if you consider several add-ons which have been 
 implemented/improved at the same time (Slony, PL/Java, etc.) it's even more 
 momentous.   If this isn't 8.0, then what will be?   

I tend to agree, and was about to bring up the point myself.

regards, tom lane

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering -- The great debate

2004-07-31 Thread Tom Lane
Peter Eisentraut [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
 Alvaro Herrera wrote:
 What was the rule for increasing the first number after just before
 7.0?

 That was just to avoid having to release a 6.6.6, which Jan had clearly 
 been working towards. :-)

AFAIR, we had informally been referring to that release as 6.6 right up
until about the start of beta, when it was proposed that it should be
called 7.0 because of the extent of the changes since 6.5, and that
motion carried.  If we decide now to rename 7.5 to 8.0, it will be
exactly the same process.  I don't think Peter's process-based
objections are valid at all.

It strikes me that we have more than enough major changes since 7.4 to
justify calling this 8.0, both in terms of major features that users
have been asking for, and in terms of the extent of internal
reorganization (and consequent need for beta testing ...).

 Seriously, major version jumps correspond to epoch-like changes, like 
 when the code moved out of Berkeley, or when we switched from bug 
 fixing to adding features.

Two commments about that.  One, I think you are engaging in historical
revisionism about the reason for the 6.6/7.0 renaming.  I don't recall
that 7.0 marked any particular watershed in terms of our general bug
level, nor that we saw it in those terms when we decided to renumber.

Two, I think 7.5/8.0 will indeed be epochal in terms of the size of our
user community.  Win32 native support will mean a great deal on the low
end, and savepoints, PITR, and reliable replication (Slony) will mean a
great deal in terms of our credibility as an enterprise-class database.

regards, tom lane

PS: IIRC I was on the nay side in the 6.6-to-7.0 rename vote, so I
think I definitely have standing to be in favor this time.

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering -- The great debate

2004-07-31 Thread Bruce Momjian

I am fine with either numbering, but I think the 8.0 might make more
sense.

---

Tom Lane wrote:
 Peter Eisentraut [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
  Alvaro Herrera wrote:
  What was the rule for increasing the first number after just before
  7.0?
 
  That was just to avoid having to release a 6.6.6, which Jan had clearly 
  been working towards. :-)
 
 AFAIR, we had informally been referring to that release as 6.6 right up
 until about the start of beta, when it was proposed that it should be
 called 7.0 because of the extent of the changes since 6.5, and that
 motion carried.  If we decide now to rename 7.5 to 8.0, it will be
 exactly the same process.  I don't think Peter's process-based
 objections are valid at all.
 
 It strikes me that we have more than enough major changes since 7.4 to
 justify calling this 8.0, both in terms of major features that users
 have been asking for, and in terms of the extent of internal
 reorganization (and consequent need for beta testing ...).
 
  Seriously, major version jumps correspond to epoch-like changes, like 
  when the code moved out of Berkeley, or when we switched from bug 
  fixing to adding features.
 
 Two commments about that.  One, I think you are engaging in historical
 revisionism about the reason for the 6.6/7.0 renaming.  I don't recall
 that 7.0 marked any particular watershed in terms of our general bug
 level, nor that we saw it in those terms when we decided to renumber.
 
 Two, I think 7.5/8.0 will indeed be epochal in terms of the size of our
 user community.  Win32 native support will mean a great deal on the low
 end, and savepoints, PITR, and reliable replication (Slony) will mean a
 great deal in terms of our credibility as an enterprise-class database.
 
   regards, tom lane
 
 PS: IIRC I was on the nay side in the 6.6-to-7.0 rename vote, so I
 think I definitely have standing to be in favor this time.
 
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-- 
  Bruce Momjian|  http://candle.pha.pa.us
  [EMAIL PROTECTED]   |  (610) 359-1001
  +  If your life is a hard drive, |  13 Roberts Road
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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering -- The great debate

2004-07-31 Thread Joshua D. Drake




Hello,

Version 7.5 is as close to a major release as I have seen in the almost
9 years I have been using PostgreSQL.
This release brings about a lot of "enterprise" features that have been
holding back PostgreSQL in a big way for
for a long time.

All of my serious customers; potential, existing and past has all at
one point or another requested most if not
all of the features being released onto the world with 7.5. In fact the
only ones that I can think of off the top 
of my head that isn't in the current list of availables is table
partitioning and to a lesser extent two phase commit.

This release definately deserves a major version jump. If it were up to
me it would be more than one (I would
call it 10h for obvious reasons. O.k. the h is a joke but I am serious
about the 10) just from a marketing 
standpoint. I could argue a major version jump just from the fact that
we finally have a port to the most used 
operating system (regardless if that is good or bad) in the world.

Sincerely,

Joshua D. Drake




Tom Lane wrote:

  Josh Berkus [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
  
  
Even if Savepoints don't make it, we'll still have:

  
  
Savepoints are in, as is exception-trapping in functions (at least
plpgsql, the other PLs are on their own :-().

Some other major improvements you didn't mention:

Cross-datatype comparisons are indexable (at least for common
combinations); this solves a huge performance gotcha

Dependency-aware pg_dump

Much more complete support for rowtype operations


  
  
This is more features worth mentioning than we've ever had in a single release 
before -- and if you consider several add-ons which have been 
implemented/improved at the same time (Slony, PL/Java, etc.) it's even more 
momentous.   If this isn't 8.0, then what will be?   

  
  
I tend to agree, and was about to bring up the point myself.

			regards, tom lane

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Command Prompt, Inc., home of Mammoth PostgreSQL - S/ODBC and S/JDBC
Postgresql support, programming shared hosting and dedicated hosting.
+1-503-667-4564 - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://www.commandprompt.com
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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering -- The great debate

2004-07-31 Thread Christopher Kings-Lynne
So, as far as you're concerned, there will never ever be an 8.0.

Eventually we'll do the Sun switcheroo and follow release 7.12 by 13.0.
How about 7.5i :)
Chris
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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering -- The great debate

2004-07-31 Thread Christopher Kings-Lynne
This is more features worth mentioning than we've ever had in a single release 
before -- and if you consider several add-ons which have been 
implemented/improved at the same time (Slony, PL/Java, etc.) it's even more 
momentous.   If this isn't 8.0, then what will be?   

I tend to agree, and was about to bring up the point myself.
I'm in favour of 8.0.  There's a time to be humble and a time for hard 
work to be properly recognised.

Chris
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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering -- The great debate

2004-07-31 Thread Bruce Momjian
Christopher Kings-Lynne wrote:
 This is more features worth mentioning than we've ever had in a single release 
 before -- and if you consider several add-ons which have been 
 implemented/improved at the same time (Slony, PL/Java, etc.) it's even more 
 momentous.   If this isn't 8.0, then what will be?   
  
  
  I tend to agree, and was about to bring up the point myself.
 
 I'm in favour of 8.0.  There's a time to be humble and a time for hard 
 work to be properly recognized.

FYI, the move to 7.0 was done after we realized that 6.5 should have
been numbered 7.0.

-- 
  Bruce Momjian|  http://candle.pha.pa.us
  [EMAIL PROTECTED]   |  (610) 359-1001
  +  If your life is a hard drive, |  13 Roberts Road
  +  Christ can be your backup.|  Newtown Square, Pennsylvania 19073

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Re: [HACKERS] Version Numbering -- The great debate

2004-07-31 Thread Steve Atkins
On Sun, Aug 01, 2004 at 12:20:59PM +0800, Christopher Kings-Lynne wrote:
 This is more features worth mentioning than we've ever had in a single 
 release before -- and if you consider several add-ons which have been 
 implemented/improved at the same time (Slony, PL/Java, etc.) it's even 
 more momentous.   If this isn't 8.0, then what will be?   
 
 
 I tend to agree, and was about to bring up the point myself.
 
 I'm in favour of 8.0.  There's a time to be humble and a time for hard 
 work to be properly recognised.

We deploy postgresql as part of an application that goes out to big,
IT-savvy corporations. So far we've shipped 7.2.* and 7.4.* (the
upgrade pain to 7.3 outweighed the benefits, so we put that off
and put it off until 7.4 was available).

8.0.0 suggests, to my customers at least, a brand new release with
either massive re-architecting, many new features or both and that's
likely to be riddled with bugs. While it would be unlikely that we'd
ship 7.5.0 to customers (I suspect there'd be a .1 release before we
were comfortable with the .0 release, given the massive changes)
there's not a chance we'd ship 8.0.0 - even though it's the identical
codebase - because of that perception. Probably not 8.0.1 either.

From the discussions I've seen and the number and size of changes I've
seen go into the codebase recently I suspect 8.0.0 might be quite an
appropriate version number on several levels. There have been a lot of
major changes in this release, some significant enough, I think,
anyway, to justify a bump in major version number.

Those major changes touch the code everywhere (especially nested
transactions - where the breadth of the changes scares me) and are
likely to lead to a number of obscure bugs that will be problematic
and will probably survive through an extended beta period. People are
likely to expect more bugs in a .0.0 release - but that also means
they're likely to be much more tolerant of them (nice functionality,
but some problematic bugs - but it's a .0.0 release, so we expect some
bugs, but we also expect the .0.2 or .1.0 release to be _really_
good.).

So, from a managing customer expectations POV, 8.0.0 looks an
appropriate version number for at least two major reasons. I'd rather
end-users treat this release as a development/preview release, forgive
the bugs and take a minor release or two before expecting the level of
stability _we_ expect from postgresql - and I suspect that may be
doubly appropriate for the large base of potential win32 users.

Just a perspective from a company that uses and redistributes
PostgreSQL to end-users.

Cheers,
  Steve


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