Thunderbird 91 Is Flying Soon As First Major Mail Client Update In A Year

[phoronix]

Phoronix: Thunderbird 91 Is Flying Soon As First Major Mail Client Update In A Year

Thunderbird 91.0 is approaching release as an annual feature release to this open-source, cross-platform mail client and RSS reader. Given the current release is Thunderbird 78 from last July, there is a lot in store for this "2021" update...

https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=Thunderbird-91-Coming-Soon

[kon14]

I wish they'd scrap this whole Chromified versioning, at least for a project that doesn't actually push out monthly releases.
Like how does going from 78 to 91 make any sense? Having trouble with Thunderbird 142? Just rollback to 117 or possibly try out the 183 beta.

[perpetually high]

Having trouble with Thunderbird 142? Just rollback to 117 or possibly try out the 183 beta.

LOL. Nailed it.

So, what exactly happened to semantic versioning (https://semver.org) and why did we move away from it again?

Some things make sense, like Ubuntu's 20.04.3 scheme (20 the year, 04 the month, 3 the patch).

But to kon14's point, can we stop this madness and stop reinventing the wheel with a square?

[skeevy420]

LOL. Nailed it.

So, what exactly happened to semantic versioning (https://semver.org) and why did we move away from it again?

Some things make sense, like Ubuntu's 20.04.3 scheme (20 the year, 04 the month, 3 the patch).

But to kon14's point, can we stop this madness and stop reinventing the wheel with a square?

1. MAJOR version when you make incompatible API changes,
2. MINOR version when you add functionality in a backwards compatible manner, and
3. PATCH version when you make backwards compatible bug fixes.

Just a guess, but maybe no one wants to ensure 2. and 3. are actually backwards compatible changes. Date-based versioning doesn't have the backwards compatibility assumption that Semantic Versioning does.

[Flaburgan]

I wish they'd scrap this whole Chromified versioning, at least for a project that doesn't actually push out monthly releases.
Like how does going from 78 to 91 make any sense? Having trouble with Thunderbird 142? Just rollback to 117 or possibly try out the 183 beta.

The release number is following the one of the gecko engine, which is tied to Firefox number. I agree that makes it hard to follow for users though.

[perpetually high]

Just a guess, but maybe no one wants to ensure 2. and 3. are actually backwards compatible changes. Date-based versioning doesn't have the backwards compatibility assumption that Semantic Versioning does.

Maybe, not surprised people taking the lazy way out. I'd like a reason from a maintainer on why this is done. It's very confusing and not helpful, so if there's a reason that's not commonly known, I'd love to hear it.

The release number is following the one of the gecko engine, which is tied to Firefox number. I agree that makes it hard to follow for users though.

The public or end-users should not be concerned with internal technicalities. If that's the reason, I think it's terrible. That should be in the changelog and only of concern to developers.

[perpetually high]

So I've been using 91 beta, and man I'm impressed. I think I'm going to start using Thunderbird, dagnammit.

I was able to easily enter my Fastmail username and password (have to use app password for proper syncing and encryption, fyi), and it fetched all the necessary imap details and I was up and running.

I also set up the Chat feature and got irc working (though I still use BitchX with SSL and irssi, cause I'm a real one).

But yeah, this is good stuff. I'm gonna start using it.

edit: Also, this is apt from Hacker News: Why I wrote PGP (a must read).

[Awesomeness]

Like how does going from 78 to 91 make any sense?

Thunderbird mirrors the version number of the Firefox release it's based on. That's not really that hard to understand.

[perpetually high]

Thunderbird mirrors the version number of the Firefox release it's based on. That's not really that hard to understand.

Except that's not what he said. He asked how does it make sense, you explained their reasoning behind it. Maybe work on your reading comprehension.

[PluMGMK]

Does anyone know if a Muttator equivalent for modern Thunderbird releases is being worked on? I'm guessing not, since the interest always seems really low…