Product naming / wiki page naming / restructuring

Dr. H. Nikolaus Schaller hns at computer.org
Fri Jul 27 13:25:26 CEST 2007


>>> OpenMoko-0.5 or whatever scheme is already in place.
>>
>> -2007 and -2008 so far.  We might have 200x.y at some point.

Hm. I think using year-names is not a good choice for software  
versions (mainly talking about stable releases).
It psychologically forces you to do one major release every year. But  
if you do it twice a year you run into troubles.

MS used Windows 95, NT, 2000, XP, Vista and Service Packs, etc.
Apple uses 10.3 (Panther), 10.4 (Tiger), 10.5 (Leopard) and  
fractional numbers etc.

What I really found confusing is Maemo and the Nokia tablets. I know  
that I have a N770
but I would have to spend too much time to find what is the latest  
release that runs on my device.
So it is now used as a paperweight :-(

> If you take a look on PalmOS, I always hated that I cannot install my
> PalmOS version X.Y to my device, because it's only for new hardware.

Yes, like Maemo 3.0 that is to my knowledge not available for the  
Nokia 770
(and if I do not spend the time to find out, how should a consumer do?).

> AFAIK, there will be only one software name for all (future) Neo
> devices, so how to name it and understand that you need *minimum*
> version 2008.0 to use with your device (for example) ?
>
> And the opposite, could you upgrade your Neo1973 GTA01v4 with the
> OpenMoko-2009.2 ?

Yes, that is IMHO a very important requirement:

*every* new stable release should run on *all* older hardware (at  
least up to 3 or 4 years!).

But it *may* have limitations in supporting new features and provide  
some fall-back.




More information about the community mailing list