Quoting Justin McAleer justin@fehuq.com:
A lot of the posts in this thread seem to be debating between version numbering and storage layout, which are not mutually exclusive
Yes, but this only addresses the problem at the source, not at the redistribution point (mirrors, rpm repositories, distributions, etc)
If people still manage to get confused about which version to run after all that, well, should you be responsible for configuring the software for them too? You have to stop lowering the common denominator at some point.
People running Fedora Core run 0.99, and they do not know it isn't production (since it comes with FC, which they don't know isn't production). People running RHEL 5 apparently get a release candidate, but they may think it is production since RHEL 5 is _supposed_ to be production. So they ask here, and get flamed for running a non-production version. It isn't their fault.
I go to atrpms or dag wieers or elsewhere, and it might list both devel and production ones, but it doesn't say that, it just lists version numbers. How am I to know, unless I'm smart enough to go to the original web site and check? I might just assume the highest number one is the one I should run, not knowing it is a devel version.
New users (Fedora Core type users) will get confused. What you do on the main site is important, but it is not the whole story from the end-user's point of view.
-- Eric Rostetter The Department of Physics The University of Texas at Austin
Go Longhorns!