Ubuntu 8.04 [LWN.net]

Ubuntu 8.04

Posted May 5, 2008 16:40 UTC (Mon) by jabby (subscriber, #2648)
Parent article: Linux Shootout: 7 Desktop Distros Compared (InformationWeek)

The original article got it wrong everywhere, but there's no reason to duplicate the error
here in the LWN blurb...  It's "8.04" not "8.4".

People are already confused about the Ubuntu version numbering... let's not deprive them of
this subtle clue.  :o)

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Ubuntu 8.04

Posted May 5, 2008 16:50 UTC (Mon) by jake (editor, #205) [Link]

> The original article got it wrong everywhere, but there's no reason to 
> duplicate the error here in the LWN blurb...  It's "8.04" not "8.4".

You make a good point, fixed now, thanks!

jake

Ubuntu 8.04

Posted May 5, 2008 20:10 UTC (Mon) by oak (guest, #2786) [Link]

As it's just <year>.<month>, does it really matter whether the month is 
prefixed with a zero or not (04 and 4 are both April....)?

Ubuntu 8.04

Posted May 5, 2008 21:46 UTC (Mon) by seyman (subscriber, #1172) [Link]

> As it's just <year>.<month>, does it really matter whether the month is 
> prefixed with a zero or not (04 and 4 are both April....)?

For some counting methods, 8.4 > 8.10 .
So, yes, some times, it really matters. :-)

Ubuntu 8.04

Posted May 5, 2008 21:57 UTC (Mon) by JoeBuck (subscriber, #2330) [Link]

If you use an approach to version numbers that says that 8.4 > 8.10, you force both RPM-based and .deb-based distributions to use epochs to tell the package manager that 8.4 is newer. So you would be well advised not to do this: don't interpret version numbers as rational numbers, the standard convention is to treat them as sequences of integers, lexicographically sorted.

Ubuntu 8.04

Posted May 6, 2008 2:37 UTC (Tue) by jamesh (subscriber, #1159) [Link]

The problem here is with people rather than computers.  The version numbers look like normal
decimal numbers, and people know that 8.4 is greater than 8.10.

By using 8.04 instead, the ambiguity goes away.

Ubuntu 8.04

Posted May 6, 2008 9:32 UTC (Tue) by Los__D (subscriber, #15263) [Link]

IMHO the problem is someone defining x.1x > x.2 in the first place...