Succeeding GNOME 3.38 Will Be "GNOME 40" - Yes, GNOME Forty

[mcqigo]

Gnome has no team which is heavy relying on planning & implementing features for next release so there aren't that many changes between releases for user to specifically remember one release. We can compare gnome 2 & 3, but there will be no significant difference between 3.38 and 4.0/3.40/40.

[schmidtbag]

Why not use year.month like Ubuntu has done for years? "40" alone sounds nonsensical. Mesa-style version numbering (year.patchlevel) would also work.

This is actually asked in the Discord (I've wondered the same thing):
Q: Why not using the year/month scheme?
A: While date-based versioning schemes do make it easier to resolve the issues of “when was this version of GNOME released” and “how old is my version of GNOME compared to the latest one”, they still rely on knowing that the version number is, indeed, date based. Even the “gold standard” of date-based releases, Ubuntu, has users confused about the version numbers, as outlined in multiple topics on different user support forums. Additionally, a date-based versioning scheme requires on a twice-per-year schedule, with stable releases that continue over the span of a year each, introduces possible collisions and uncertainty, unless more numeric components are added, thus making version numbers more complicated.

[eydee]

Mozilla Gnome. Nice.

[alcalde]

They must be taking their lead from OpenSUSE, which went from 13.2 to 42.1. 42.2 and 42.3 followed, then it was back to 15.0.

[S.Pam]

They must be taking their lead from OpenSUSE, which went from 13.2 to 42.1. 42.2 and 42.3 followed, then it was back to 15.0.

Thats a LEAP

[JPFSanders]

Read some of the anecdotes on The Old New Thing. The lengths Microsoft goes to in the name of backwards compatibility are insane.

Used to, this is not the case any more, at least not to such degree as in the past.

[leipero]

Huh?
From the article:
"The developers decided to change the versioning scheme due to the GNOME 3.xx minor version "getting undwieldy", not going to GNOME 4.0 to avoid confusion with the imminent GTK 4.0 release, and other reasons."
And from the source:
"A: With GTK 4.0 being released during the next development cycle, calling the next version of GNOME “4.0” would have unfortunate/unintended implications about the platform, especially from an engagement and marketing perspective. "

Gathered that from this:
Q: Why do we need a new versioning scheme?
A: After nearly 10 years of 3.x releases, the minor version number is getting unwieldy. It is also exceedingly clear that we’re not going to bump the major version because of technological changes in the core platform, like we did for GNOME 2 and 3, and then piling on a major UX change on top of that. Radical technological and design changes are too disruptive for maintainers, users, and developers; we have become pretty good at iterating design and technologies, to the point that the current GNOME platform, UI, and UX are fairly different from what was released with GNOME 3.0, while still following the same design tenets.

Q: Why not 4.0?
A: With GTK 4.0 being released during the next development cycle, calling the next version of GNOME “4.0” would have unfortunate/unintended implications about the platform, especially from an engagement and marketing perspective. We want to decouple GNOME from deep changes in the application development platform, so that GTK can be released more often, and provide “long term support” major versions 2, instead of delaying development cycles that inevitably end up into “rewrite the world” events. GNOME is not just a technological platform, but also a set of design guidelines and an ethos 2, and bumping the major version along with GTK does not reflect that.

[You-]

Just use semantic versioning for god sakes.

They will be.

Why not use year.month like Ubuntu has done for years? "40" alone sounds nonsensical. Mesa-style version numbering (year.release.patchlevel) would also work.

Such a number scheme is not semantically versioned and some might think the spring release is a major release and the autumn one a point release whilst it doesnt really work that way.

Gnome 3.40 becoming gnome 40 seems reasonable.

[schmidtbag]

Gathered that from this:

I'm still not understanding how that's suggesting there won't be a 4.0. The 2nd quote (which I also quoted) suggests there will be one.

[jo-erlend]

When Windows jumped from 8 to 10, as dumb as the reason was, at least there was a technical reason for them not to use 9.

When Slackware jumped from 4 to 7 to keep up with the version change bandwagon we pointed at them an laughed because that's a dumb reason.

With GNOME jumping from 3 to 40 we I think we need to see if they're smoking crack because that's beyond dumb. Then again, it says a lot about GNOME users if the GNOME devs think that GNOME 4.0 and GTK 4.0 is confusing.

Do I need Windows 3 to run The Elder Scrolls 3: Morrowind? Is that how computers work now? Because that's how retarded y'all sound.

Haven't Gnome had around 40 major releases?