Thanks for the explanation, Chris.
I was thinking on using some of the eliot versions with my own builds, like this: 2222.01, and maybe unix/windows guys could do the same, so we need a prefix, something like 2222.M01 for mac, U01 for unix, W01 for windows... ... or something like that. Anyway... this discussion borns in pharo list, but concerns more to vm-dev list. I'm copying email there :)
cheers, Esteban
El 21/12/2011, a las 9:28p.m., Chris Cunningham escribió:
On Wed, Dec 21, 2011 at 2:44 PM, Esteban Lorenzano estebanlm@gmail.com wrote:
Hi,
and yes, I know what you feel about version numbers... we (guys working with vm) should find an unique versioning number. But is hard, right now we have this different numbering:
- Eliot has his own version number (I think based on svn commit version)
- Each platform (Linux, Windows and Mac) has his own versioning too.
- There are also 4.x versions alive (for mac, at least)
I also don't know what does each version means (3.8 for unix, etc.). I named cocoa versions 6.x because older versions based on carbon where 5.x, so I thought: changing from carbon to cocoa is important enough to have a new major version... but I dunno.
The old numbering system came from pre-Pharo days, when the VM was just for Squeak. In those days, the VM number was meant to sync with the current Squeak image release - so vm 3.8 for Unix was the VM that accompanied the Squeak 3.8 release, compiled for the Unix platform. Each platform (and, indeed, each variant - such as Cocoa/Carbon) would use the same main version number, but with some other distinction built on (and these did change by platform).
Eliot's VM now supports a wide range of roughly compatible Smalltalks (or near smalltalks), such as Pharo, Squeak, Croquet, Cuis, Newspeak, and probably others. In that environment, with each near-smalltalk having their own numbering schemes, the old numbering convention just doesn't make sense. So, his using the apparent SVN commit number makes as much sense as anything - probably a lot more than some.
As for what you should call the Pharo branded and tweaked versions, that is obviously up to you. I would suggest finding something that makes it easy for us users to figure out which version of the PharoVM works with which Pharo image, if possible.
-Chris