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Java 1.5.0 Now Officially Java 5.0
Quantum Jim writes "In a move which out-does Netscape's one-version number skip and Winamp's two-numbers skip, Sun has announced that the upcoming Java2 release will be marketed as version 5.0, skipping three-and-a-half numbers. Can version 6.022E23 be far behind? Thanks to David Flanagan for the heads-up."
Slackware's comes to mind. Any others?
Winamp 5 isn't exactly Winamp version 5. It's more like 3.5. They used the number 5 because they wanted the features of 3 with the speed and ability of 2. 2+3=5. And that's where they got the number.
Etiquette is etiquette. He kills his mother but he can't wear grey trousers.
From briefly viewing some literature about Java 1.5.0 (er, 5.0... W0w!) the feature that excites me most about this is the ability to strongly type container classes, such as one can do in Ada or C++.
Joy.
that number skip was quite huge too :p
Isn't GNU Emacs really at version number 1.21.x.y but they just skip the leading "1." when writing it? Then this would be the same, except that it's just a programming language and not an operating system in desperate need of a good editor.
War is one of the most horrible things a human can be exposed to. And one of the worlds largest industries.
Sun already jumped 1.2 and called it "2".
Hmm... That must be some kind of record?
Although Microsoft did go from Windows NT 4 to Windows 2000, that wasn't really a version jump (Windows 2000 = Windows NT 5) but a change of branding.
Anyone know even greater version inflations?
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
This will go great with my new copy of Linux 10.0.
The preceeding 1 has never really meant anything it has been there since Java has been called Java IIRC. So really they have just dropped a superflous digit from the front of their version numbering system. Think of it as a refactoring...
----
Seriously though -- I love Java, but Sun needs to pull its head out of its ass before C#, PHP, and Python relegate Java to the scrap heap.
what was it.. 4.something to like 8.something?!
With how everyone has been treating them, versioning is pretty much worthless, beyond identifying what you have..
None is consistent, there is no 'standard' and its ( as is apparent by the story, and many in the past ) all arbitrary...
---- Booth was a patriot ----
That's only one skip, not two.
Right now Sun markets Java as Java2, but all the developer's documentation refers to the internal version number 1.4 (soon to be 1.5). Hopefully they will grow a brain and drop this scheme and just stick to the one version from now on because it confuses everybody the first time they come accross it.
TWW
"Encyclopedia" is to "Wikipedia" what "Library" is to "Some people at a bus stop"
"This is the version you're looking for."
[waves hand Alec Guinness style]
They should've just adopted an existing versioning system such as the one GNU Emacs uses and called it Java 15.0 to avoid creating any unnecessary confusion.
my sig's at the bottom of the page.
I thought Java was brilliant enough to cope with such errors. Duh.
6.022E23 is Avogadro's number, the number of atoms in a mole of an element.
I'd settle for 3.0 if they had picked that. Java 1.2 would be 2.0 (inner classes, collections, other major additions).
it was confusing enough when java 1.2 was marketed as "java 2," and we subsequently saw java 2 1.3 and java 2 1.4. But java 2 5.0? That's just rediculous. :)
Anyone who says this is irrelevant, we should focus on the technology etc, has failed to understand that software is about more than technical details.
Managers don't understand the details - they don't bother to learn that 5.0 is really 1.5, and they make decisions based on their high level views.
Sun has hurt Java's name, and let its developers down, with this absurd naming move, a repeat of the shambolic schizophrenic 1.2/2.0 business years ago.
So now we have Java 2 Version 5????? Employers will want to know why developers haven't done any version 3 and version 4. And it will certainly confuse the crap out of them.
Java has a good name for professionalism, but whoever came up with this ought to hang their head in shame.
God, I hate marketing. Why do you have to have yet another number attached to a product? I could never figure what the hell Sun was talking about when they would go off on "Java 2", but then sprinkle in "1.4" or "1.5" when talking about the JDK. or JRE.
Jesus. Just give me a version number so I can track what it's compatible with, and what features it has. If you're bumping up your version number for a product, bump them for all related ones as well, in the same increment. Don't make me try to figure out what version number of the language is supported by which version number of the developer's kit for god's sake. Is it so damn hard?
I thought marketing was suppose to create clarity in the minds of the potential customer. Screwing around with numbering schemes isn't the way to do that. I don't care what your internal taxonomies are. Just label the thing, and stick with it.
I also take it that Sun's marketing/engineering is stealing their "internal" project naming protocols from Apple?
Remember when they released Solaris 2.7 as Solaris 7 instead? Nothing new here.
There are 10 kinds of people: ones who understand ternary, ones who don't, and ones who think this joke is about binary
Marathon once changed its name to Snickers. Opal Fruits became Starburst. The Splicer sank without trace. What happened to Spangles?
Stick Men
When I have made my revolutionary combined Video Editor / Calculator / 'Turn your computer into a washing machine' Program, I start with e.g. version 2^364289-2^182145+1, and then search for nice prime numbers downwards, until I reach 1, and then I'll have to learn something about complex numbers, I guess, or maybe stop developing the program.
Well there has been some speculation for the past several years what will happen when apple set to MacOS 10.9 (X.9)?
Will it be 11? XI?
At the JavaOne conference after releasing the Beta 2 version of the JDK, Sun announced that java 1.5 would be Java 5, which is much like Java 1.2 (that was Java 2), but not like Java 1.3 or 1.4, which were merely Java 2 1.3 and Java 2 1.4, respectively.
My head hurts.
I believe Oracle started by releasing version 2.0
"to make it sound like it had improvements from the first version"
Can version 6.022E23 be far behind?
Somebody rounded down instead of nearest.
Hey, if it works as a marketing ploy and increases the number of people who want my skills, I'm all for it.
that Java is better than C#/.NET: 5.0 > 2.0. I was so confused as to which I should choose. Thanks Sun for helping!
Well, if you's RTFA, the very first line says "SUN INTRODUCES MOST SIGNIFICANT AND ADVANCED JAVA PLATFORM RELEASE IN FIVE YEARS", so ths isn't as if they picked out a random number to call the next version.
Personally though, I disagree with this type of "marketting". Version numbers should reflect the changes that are made in each release
As Sun was preparing to roll out JDK 1.2 the marketing department thought the name lacked enough flash considering all the new features. They had picked a new name, "Java 2000", and were ready to run with it when Microsoft annouced that NT 5.0 would be known as Windows 2000. I don't know if Microsoft always intended to call NT 5.0 Windows 2000, or if it was a case of them one upping Sun. Either way, the Sun marketing department was caught flat footed and needed to come up with a new name fast. That's why we have Java2.
As far as changing the name of 1.5 to 5.0, I think it makes a lot of sense. The original reason for sticking with 1.X was that a full version jump would indicate incompatibility between versions. That's never going to happen now. Incompatibility would be the death of Java, so the time is right to start using full version numbers for major releases. 1.5->5.0 shouldn't be that hard to wrap you head around.
It's almost as bad as this number skip:
One!... Two!... Five!
No, it was SunOS 5.7 = Solaris 2.7 = Solaris 7 actually. Both a rebranding and a version jump. Remember that SunOS 5.6 = Solaris 2.6.
Why not calling it just Java 2004???
After all, we are all talking about vintages aren't we?
More seriously, Sun should just drop the Java 2/5 numbering and just use the year that is launched as the "brand"... and keep a "internal" version number for identification purposes...
That would keep the market droids happy and the programmers would have both an inteligent numbering and a discreet numbering to work with...
At least there still calling it Java, Borland comes to mind, and makes me laugh.
Pascal -> Delphi -> Kylix
Perhaps had they just kept right on calling it Pascal, and incremented versions they would have some "brand awareness" for that language.
I guess the marketing department decided that a IDE justified a language name change. hehe
Wireless Cameras
Gamblers Forum
How is this going to confuse any one?
developer: I wrote this in Java version 5
manager: 5!!! what happened to 3 and 4
developer: They skipped those numbers.
manager: oh, ok then good job have a raise.
Not that this example is completely realistic but is it really that hard to understand?
Any manager that is confused by this probobly comes to work with no pants on sometimes.
01100010 01101001 01110100 01100101 00100000 01101101 01100101
What world do YOU live in? It sounds like a pretty nice place. Where I live, marketing is intended to confuse and bewilder the customer so that they pay for things that they neither want nor need.
Just as 1.2, 1.3, and 1.4 before it, 1.5 (aka 5.0) is a significant advancement over preceding versions. It deserves it's new "5.0" identity, just as the previous versions would have been better served by having dropped the "1." syntax.
...NVIDIA has released a new set of Detonator drivers version 8701012.45231256
It would be cool if it didn't suck.
The question is what will java -version or System.getProperty("java.version") show. This could be a big deal for installers that expect a specific version format string. A similar case is in Windows 2000 the api version returns 5.0 and Windows XP returns 5.1
In other news:
Linus Torvald announced today that the next version of the Linux kernel will be released a "Linux Kernel Version 11". Said Torvald, "Thats one more than Mac's OS, and several more than Microsoft, so people will know its better."
Tequila: It's not just for breakfast anymore!
I'm going to be three years older in a years time
What happened from Gentoo Linux 1.4 to Gentoo Linux 2004.0!!!
Go gettem tiger.
It goes from God, to Jerry, to me.
I was going to make a joke about how Sun is still calling it the Java Development Kit release 1.1 for Java 2.0 version 5.0, but this has been frequently noticed by others in this thread. So for those who are not interested in sorting through the bewildering list of packages available on the Java Download page, here's an ugly ascii kitty cat.
^ ^
=o.o=
~
Wasn't SunOS at something like 5.3, then Solaris 2.4 through 2.7? Now it's Solaris 8 and 9 (I guess the next version would be X...assuming there's a next version).
Nothing new here. Just Sun being its normal confusing self. Next week, it will be called Dark Roast 6 (Java's due for a name change as well).
What happened with the java 3 and java 4 or is this thing gonna be like Leonard 6 In all the senses :)
Will we ever get rid of the redundant/confusing number 2 from Java? A new major version like 1.5/5.0 would be a good opportunity.
JSE/JEE instead of J2SE/J2EE etc.
While I share everyone's initial reaction, it's not completely far-fetched.
Consider the amount of progress made from JDK 1.0 to JDK 1.4. The changes would reflect a 1.0->4.0 versioning scheme much better than 1.0-1.4. And instead of having 1.4.2_01 they would have 4.2.1, which would more accurately reflect the singificance of each update.
So. If you look at it as Sun simply dropping the initial 1 to 'adjust' the versioning scale, it actuall makes quite a bit of sence, since we've gone from 1.0 to 2.0, 3.0, 4.0 and now 5.0. And the changes made between those versions definitely warrant a new major version number in my opinion.
So while this weird versioning is annoying (I *still* cringe at the thought of "Java 2 1.4"), if they will now stick to the new versioning scheme it should reflect reality better than before.
/ Peter Schuller
--
peter.schuller@infidyne.com
http://www.scode.org
... when i first read it, it sounded like and old serie. Maybe the full name will be JawaII 5.0 ?
proprietary languages suck
I was at one of the many hoopla events around the country for the unveiling of the successor to Sun's wildly successful SPARC 1..
The talking head guy looked at us all from up on the stage and babbled on about how "people kept asking us when?! When?! When were we going to release the SPARC 2... Well, the SPARC 2 wouldn't have been good enough. So I present to you, the Sparcstation 10!!!!" People snickered.
I yelled "does it go to eleven?!" to some knowing chuckles.
What comes after OS X?
English is easier said than done.
You're thinking of binary arithmetic, not Boolean arithmetic. In Boolean arithmetic, AND is synonymous with multiplication -- hence 3 AND 2 = 6 because 3 x 2 = 6. See?
The official PHB policy on version numbers is to never buy version i.0. (which is not really too stupid--I know some IT managers who would still have a job if they skipped i.0 of their ERP systems) So if Sun wants maximum value out of the version number change, they should be calling this version 5.1.
They didn't really skip versions so much as they changed how they are numbered. Versions are supposed to be m.n (m=major, n=minor) and Sun has been numbering the Java releases as 1.x (minor point releases) when they should have been x.0 (major release). Sun just brought some better clarity to their version numbering.
Windows 95 = Windows 4.00.950 on MSDOS 7
Windows 98 = Windows 4.10.1998 on MSDOS 7
Windows 2000 = Windows NT 5.00.2195
For completeness...
Windows XP = Windows NT 5.1.2600
Come on, out-pedant me...
-- *~()____) This message will self-destruct in 5 seconds...
OTOH, there is absolutely no logic behind the U.S. market designations of Canon's mid-range SLR bodies. They went from the Elan, to the Elan II, to the Elan 7, to the Elan 7N.
Their biggest leap yet was the staggering 4.4 version-number skip from Solaris 2.6 to Solaris 7.
It's NOT Java 5.0, that would actually make sense.
:P
If you read the press release linked from the blog post, it's "Java 2 5.0".
I wonder if 1.6 will then be "Java 2 5.0 1.6", like 1.3/1.4 was "Java 2 1.3/1.4"...
All Glory To The Hypnotoad!
What about the critical jump from Leisure Suit Larry from 3 STRAIGHT TO 5.
Earth Shattering!!!
(ok, maybe not)
"Faith: Belief without evidence in what is told by one who speaks without knowledge, of things without parallel." - A.B.
Exactly. This isn't a version number "skip"; it's a version number "strip".
The second digit becomes the first and the third the second. This is perfectly in line with accepted norms when you consider the improvements of 1.4.2 over 1.4.1. For minor increments, Sun had to resort to seriously odd numbers like 1.4.2_04.
Makes sense to me. The "2" in J2SE is unfortunate, but at this point the numericity of that character is dead. J2SE, J2EE and J2ME are just brands, not versions.
Windows 2000 is not the upgrade to Windows 98, its the upgrade to NT 4.0. Windows ME was the upgrade to 98.
Mathematics is made of 50 percent formulas, 50 percent proofs, and 50 percent imagination.
n/a
If someone says he and his monkey have nothing to hide, they almost certainly do.
I thought a mole was that thing britney spears couldn't keep on the same side of her face for a straight week.
GG Madonna Wannabie
Actually, if you consider the winamp's 3 to 5 gap a two-number skip, there is no really jump with netscape's one-version number skip.
Sorry, this sig is beneath your current threshold
I wish their math worked in my pocket.
My cat's picked up a Hammer. HEY! Put down that Hammer. Put Down that Hamm...THUNK!
I think it was around 1988 or 89 and Watcom C came out with an initial version of 6.0 to leapfrog Microsoft C 5.0 out of the gate.
Seriously.
Actualy, they're only skipping 2 numbers, 3 and 4. "Java 1.5" is actualy JDK 1.5
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
Let's not forget Slackware's jump from 4.0 to 7.0.
You need to re-check your definitions.. Militias are NOT professional, thus '..active duty in Iraq' is a ludicrous statement. ( as is your '6 year' reference ). They explicitly are not a governmental body by definition.
The rest I wont even bother commenting on, they don't warrant my time ( read my journal for your answers ) and its OT anyway.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
I don't see the problem. They can call their product whatever they want to call it. We would be rather childish to complain.
It never made sense to me that Java 2 was actually 1.4 in the first place.
So what's the big deal. Today it's 5.0 tomorrow it's Math.log(1000000); Who can keep track?
If you do what you always did, you get what you always got.
There is officially a Leisure Suit Larry 4, subtitled "The Missing Floppies". http://pc.ign.com/objects/621/621156.html
I seldem see products with version numbers > 10:
RedHat 9 -> FC 1
MS Office 6 -> Office 95
Photoshop 7 -> Photoshop CS (?)
Bigger numbers make the product looks old, which customers probably don't like (Of course we still have Oracle 11)
So I predict this naming scheme won't last for Java - it'll either have a new name (SunOS -> Solaris), get integrated with another product, or just die.
And don't forget we've Solaris 10 - not sure if what will happen.
with constants. You could have pre-release versions that were .618034 (1 over phi), .707 (sqrt 2 over 2), and then once the
software was released 1.414 (sqrt 2), 1.618 (phi), 2.818 (e),
3.14 (pi), etc, etc, etc. Makes sense to me and geeks will love it.
cheap labor conservatives - they want to keep you hungry enough to be thankful for minimum wage.
They should have called it
Seven of Nine
and introduced a couple of bulging container classes.
Oh, wait! 5.x to 2.x, skipping -2 major releases.
(Yes, I know Sun has two numbering systems for the same S/W)
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
I just wanted ot be among the number that points out that Netscape went from 4 -> 6, and WinAmp went from 3 -> 5, thus they both skipped a single number.
-bZj
.sig
Now *that's* marketing.
Is there anyone out there who is falling for this rubbish? Sure, give it a goofy name like "Wankle" or something, but top generating needless confusion over versioning. It's bad enough trying to figure out whether you're downloading the "private" runtime environment, the "public" one, the source development kit, source development kit for the previous version with netbeans version something-or-other... oy veh. Sun doesn't have prayer if their strategy is to out-Microsoft Microsoft. The similarities between both of them are annoyingly obvious.
Well, the 'language', the 'ideal' of java is at version 2, while the development kit is 1.4. However, apperantly Sun has decided to rename their development kit from 1.5 to 5. So now we have J2SDK 5. Which is just bizzare.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
Beta JDKs for 1.5 have been out for a while, so it's entirely possible people may have written code using 1.5 features in the past few months, in anticipation of the new release. It would make sense for them to put down J2se5 experiance, I guess.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
Numbering systems are too complicated for me. Just give me one called "New" and one called "Old". If you want to get complicated you can include "older", oldest", "newer" and "newest". This is basically a rip off of Debian's Woody, Potato, Sid, etc. scheme for the rest of us. That way the tech support guy can say...
"Do you have the Newest driver?"
"No, it's New."
"New New, or Old New?"
"Newer than New."
"Oh, okay, in that case, simply turn it off and turn it on."
Hey, if Grandma can't roll her own Linux from a Stage 1 Gentoo floppy, she probably can't keep track of all these goshdarn newfangled confounded version numbers either.
I'm not normally an irrational zealous dickhead, but I figure "When in Rome..."
Sometime in the mid-90's Sybase jumped from 4.9.2 to 10 (I believe that they wanted people to call it X). 4.9.2 was solid and 10 was a mess, and I don't think that Sybase every really recovered.
Yes.
Glad I could help. If you've got any more questions, let me know.
They did this before, with Solaris. Solaris 7 was actually Solaris 2.7. Same for Solaris 8, and 9 (2.8 and 2.9, respectively). I don't know why Sun has an aversion to keeping the major version number, but they do.
The Borg did in their Senate candidate. It was not a pretty sight.
Perhaps what we need is the equivalent of a DUNS number for software products. If I were to implement the scheme, I'd probably do what Perforce does and identify releases by the year and release-number within the year. E.g. Perforce 2001.2 is the second release of Perforce in the year 2001.
Azureus is my favourite bt client under linux (ob for win as well). but it seems a little bloated.
Do other versions of java have any performance benefit?
Like blackdown http://www.blackdown.org/ or I know ibm has a version.
Also this emulation site: http://web.utanet.at/nkehrer/jae.html does not work for me under linux. It emulates various arcade classics like defender joust etc. Someone said to me on a irc chan that it's because it probably has some win32 tie ins and not just pure java. What I get is not the plugin download prompt but just a grey screen with the java symbol in the corner.
However I've tried the azureus java browser plugin and that gives me the grey screen as well. I haven't tried 1.5 (ehm 5.0) yet on version 1.42.
Microsoft Word for Windows went from 2.0 to 6.0, probably because WordPerfect was at version 6.0.
Looks like someone in marketing at Sun got their IT department's "Strong Password Naming" document confused with the "Product Roadmap" document.
Chip H.
Take a look at solaris versions. Well there were 2 sets of versions Solaris and Sun OS
.1 .2 .3 they like getting v2 v3 that way it sounds like they are getting a major version change. But with Java Code being stablized people are still on 1.2 and 1.3 where they really should be at 1.5 for best functionally.
There was Solaris 2.5 and 2.6 then they made solaris 7 aka 2.7 then solaris 8 and solaris 9 and if you check the version numbers you get Solaris 2.9 and SunOS 5.9
This seems to be common for sun when their product seems to reach maturity and they are not planning on doing a major overhall to their product they will drop the first diget then make the 10s spot the version number. I Think it is more for an advertisement thing because a lot of people dont like getting incremental updates
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
the number of atoms in a mole of an element.
Its actually the numer of particles per mole
Your analogy about water is irrelevant because water is not an element. Yes, you are correct, but no, the grandparent was not incorrect. Although he was less general.
Nice try at some humor, but the version number isn't 95, it's just a name for the product. In fact, Windows XP is only Windows NT 5.1 so even THAT isn't a huge number difference. I guess not too many people know this?
Apple's WWDC took place at almost the same time as JavaOne. Observing the news coverage after the two shows, it's interesting to see that Steve Jobs has so successfully pulling the fight back to the OS level, despite the 3% market share of Apple. Now 'Tiger' is being mentioned everywhere Longhorn is mentioned. Apple is once again THE company against Microsoft, a position was taken by Sun with Java and RedHat with Linux for a while after the fall of Apple in the early 90s.
Sun is losing the spotlight and left to play with version number. One thing for sure, version number isn't important. Apple 10.3->10.4 jump would get more coverage them the 1.4 ~ 5.0 jump of Java.
AKA Java 2.0
Ironically, the word ironically is often used incorrectly.
Winamp 2.0 + some features of 3.0 = WINAMP 5! 2+3=5!
This makes perfect sense unlike Sun and Netscape!
...it at least deserved to be called java 3. It's different enough for that.
So a person who's new to Java goes looking for a book for his new JDK5.0 and can't find anything other than stuff for the "obviously outdated" Java2. "Jave2? I have version 5.0... aren't there any books more recent? This sucks!"
In many ways it reminds me of the confusion that rises when someone says that they are running Linux version 9 when what they really are referring to is a distribution release number and not the kernel version.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
It could be a marketing reason, but I have an alternative reason:
Saying "Java 5" is a lot easier than saying "Java 1.5.0_05", when that happens (and you know it will: latest stable release 1.4.2_05)
Wow, they only beat out Slackware by 1/2 version number. Wonder what kinda version number differences there are between Chinese years and the Gregorian calendar.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
The real problem here is and remains the lack of a separate Java standard. If there were such a thing, we'd be talking about Sun's 1.5 implementation of the Java99 or Java04 standard.
Sadly, Java has turned out to be much more like Visual Basic or Perl (a single implementation defines the "standard"), as opposed to open languages like C or C++; people just don't confuse C++ standards versions with, say, gcc versions.
The only app I could think of that could jump to 6.22e23 would be Molezilla! I'll be here all night! Try the veal, its great!
Internet Explorer did some major version number skips, which left many people confused.
The first production-ready release of Internet Explorer was numbered 5.0.
The mostly-unusable Alpha test versions were numbered 1.0, 2.0, and 3.0, and the still-crash-prone Beta release was numbered 4.0.
Of course, Microsoft would never admit that.
Microsoft followed a similar numbering scheme with Windows, where the first production-ready release was numbered 3.1.
... Sun also do it with the names.
i nternet_ecommerce.html) takes you to a page to download "Sun[tm] ONE Directory Server 5.2" The name change occurred late last year IIRC. Is it any wonder clients get confused?
:(
Take for example the iPlanet suite that became the Sun ONE suite that became the Sun Java System. The name changes did not necessarily coincide with product update releases - just marketing whims IMHO. On top of that you have the version number debacles and the addition of tags like Standard or Enterprise edition.
Even Sun can't keep up: The "Free Download: Sun Java System Directory Server 5.2" link here (http://wwws.sun.com/software/product_categories/
Searching for any sort of help is an exercise in permutations:
(iPlanet OR (Sun ONE) OR (Sun Java System)) AND (Directory OR LDAP) AND Server AND (what you're looking for).
SunSolve is not good at complex searches
The drugs in marketing must be good because the logic isn't.
Patent litigation: A doctrine of Mutually Assured Destruction... in which everyone seems willing to push the button
Any indications yet as to when we'll see Tiger on Tiger (which sounds vaguely like an educational nature film made by the somewhat kinky)? Once we get past OS X 10.4 (which, by the way, is another weird versioning scheme), it starts to sound like a great cats breeding program.
Because d00d, nothing is as fast as Gentoo Linux. :-)
Karma: It's all a bunch of tree-huggin' hippy crap!
JDK 1.2 was Java2 v1.2.
JDK 1.5 is now Java2 v5.0.
Big difference, there. Take a look on the site if you don't believe that it is still "Java2". Personally I thought it was time for Java3, since the language has changed so damn much between 1.4 and 1.5. :-)
Karma: It's all a bunch of tree-huggin' hippy crap!
Oracle and Sybase have been leapfrogging each other for years. And taken separately some of their version numbering doesn't make sense, but taken together it does.
Cue (note that difference between that and queue) the Database Holy Wars...
What happened to version 1.666? [/doom]
/^[A-Z0-9._%+-]+@[A-Z0-9.-]+\.[A-Z]{2,4}$/i
Let take a look at some airliner sequences. Just when you think they're being consistent, they zing you.
Airbus:
A300
A310 up 10
A320 up 10
A330 up 10
A340 up 10
A319 down 21
A321 up 2
A380 up 59
Boeing
707
727 up 20
737 up 10
747 up 10
757 up 10
767 up 10
777 up 10
717 down 60
7E7 D0?
I guess they've been using HEX all along. Who the $#%^ versions in HEX?
Is it just me or does this just smell like a marketing gimmick?
/. allready :)
Think about it: If the release was 1.5, noone would probably be too much exited, but when they suddenly call it "5" after 1.4, there's off course going to be more hype around it (=people hurrying to Sun site to find out what on earth is this about).
I mean it got
That was funny.
"...normal evolution would have gone Word to Frame to troff, but instead, the computer industry has gone the other way!"
In a CV?
Jou are joking, aren't you?
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Solaris is the full operating enviornment.
SunOS is the oprating system, one part of the environment.
Solaris 9 includes SunOS 2.9
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Version 5 of Netscape Navigator was prepared, but several weeks before it should be finished, some manager decided, that Netscape have to come ASAP with Gecko-based browser. So Netscape 6 was released.
Sun has made a similar change in Solaris versions in 1999. I am surprised no one has mentioned the Solaris 2.6 -> 7 version jump. To me this move seemed to be more than justified. Sun engineers said that there won't be any changes in the OS so drastic that they would justify a major version number change. So, the 2. part of the version number was pretty much useless. At the same time the Sun marketing was worried about the confussion that would arrise when Solaris reached version 2.10. They have argued that at that point some people will get confused thinking that Solaris 2.2 > Solaris 2.10
The reason was (probably) that the Mac versioning went from 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 5.1d. They then released the same version 6 for Mac as for windows.
Incidentally, the mac version was slow as molasses. It took 1.5 minutes to start on the fastest powermac at the time. It was essentially a Mac emulation of the PC version. To Mac users it also felt as it they had put a number of boxes on the ground, thrown up all of the options in the air and decided under which menu to put them based on where they fell. MS eventually gave away 5.1d for free to word 6 users.
To many the 5.1d is still the word processing gold standard.
Huh? A mole is 6.022045E23. The rounding was fine.
6.02214199E23, according to this. That's a strange discrepancy. Oh well, I don't actually care that much.
There never will be a version 3. Sun decided that the kind of change that might warrant a major version number change (e.g. BSD to SYSV, a.out to ELF) would not happen again, rather making the 2. redundant. (I guess if they ever make a brand new OS it would have to be Something 1.0.)
All the linux people complaining that the SunOS or Java versioning is too complicated should have a look at their own system. Scores of linux distributions, all with their own different, completely arbitrary versioning schemes. Dig deeper and the user encountners the joys of incompatibilities between distribution, kernel version, glibc version, libstdc++ version...
I am not much into Java, but why do they still call the SDK J2SE instead of J5SE? J2SE 5.0, i.e. Java 2 Standard Edition 5.0, looks stupid to me, but perhaps it is more logical for Java developers.
one should try google(==1.0e100) instead
The first version of OpenBSD was released as OpenBSD 2.0
You mean the version number goes up to 11?
When SCO qaquired Unixware from Novell it was at version 2.x, SCO supposedly added OpenServer 5.x features to it and voila 2+5 = 7 UnixWare 7.0!
When they're not busy being evil, they're preoccupied with silliness.
\/\/hatever... Obama was going to win anyway.
Meet the ~45th President of the United States...
I've never put much thought into it, but now that you mention it, it doesn't make any sense at all. But I have a more intriguing question, what will happen when we reach Java 2.0? will it be Java 10 ? Java 20 ? Or will we never reach 2.0 ? It will be like: and now, the much anticipated....java 1.99435653
Francisco
They are not skipping 3 1/2 release numbers, they are just getting rid of the redundant "1." in front. This is standard practice when a technology has matured enough, just drop the first digit because it has stopped being the most significant part of the version number (ie the part that really differentiates between major versions). There is no point in keeping it if you're never going to increment it. This is the case with Java. The platform has matured enough that the major version number is unlikely to ever change and they would go 1.5, 1.6, 1.7, etc. The most significant number is the second one so get rid of the first one. Sun did it with Solaris (2.7 to 8 instead of 2.8). Sybase did it as well (4.9 to 10 instead of 4.10). I'm sure lots of other companies do it although no other example come to mind right now.
There are extensions of Boolean arithmetic to the entire domain of natural numbers. They are more common in philosophy than in math or CS I think.
I'd much rather see someone do version e or version pi one of these days. If Winamp had stuck with version 3 until it got to 3.14... Hrm.
A fair bust. I remembered the number from my admittedly old Halliday and Resnick, 6.02252e23. Even wikipedia's quote of an authoritative source for 1998 has been updated a little as of 2002.
8086->80286
Of course, there was an 8088 in there, but that was a step backwards (for compatibility), and there was an 80186 which was not generally available.
Then we strip the 80, and have the 286, 386, and 486.
Then we drop numbers and call the 586 Pentium, and start the numbering over, but now with Roman numerals.
He who reflects on another man`s want of breeding, shows he wants it as much himself --Julius Caesar, per Plutarch
That's just stupendous!! You know, actually, it isn't. In fact, it's sad when the decimal number system makes "news". I wonder what is causing more measurable, wasteful distraction: the repetitive digit that was "stripped"; or the 500+ comments on slashdot alone which will be generated over the numerary stripshow?
Somewhere, corporate jerkoffs send all-too-overimportant memos regarding this trifle in the hopes of retaining group synergy. You go. Oh man, I hope this doesn't cause any walkouts.
And you know, I can see how millions of people will be upset that processing this important information regarding the removal of extraneous information from the end-user-extraneous version-number of a dying language, will cause work-related repeated-motion injuries to rise. A little bit, any way. Like the swell of inflammation over arthritic, carpal-tunneled appendages. And yet they will process it. And they will feel like nobody cares, but their feelings will be wrong.
See, people care about this issue. Important people. Like you. You're so fucking important. Take some time off. Relax. Learn not to sweat "the small stuff". One of these days, these numerological catastrophes will be a thing of the past, just echoes of your previously schizoid psyche, now healed by the relaxing waters of the Bahamas. Or maybe just some iced tea. But not sweetened iced tea, okay? I think you're geeked-up enough as it is.
"Stratigraphically the origin of agriculture and thermonuclear destruction will appear essentially simultaneous" -- Lee
Boolean arithmetic does not only work on one bit quantities. Any field which satisfies the boolean axioms can be called a boolean algebra. Binary arithmetic is simply the most common boolean algebra (and one of the most boring).
For Sun's customers -- and therefore, for Sun -- backwards compatibility is king. Absolute king. (For example, you'd never see the kind of things that happened in the last version of the Linux kernel, where stuff was introduced in 2.4 and then dropped one release later in 2.6.)
That's why /bin/sh won't ever be POSIX compliant. Some scripts out there depend on the buggy behavior, and those scripts cannot be changed.
That's why fixed portable versions of commands (including sh) go in directories other than /usr/bin. They're present and available, just not the default.
And that's why the kernel prints its version name and number as SunOS 5.y, so that parsers will continue to trigger on "SunOS" and will view even the latest version of Solaris as numerically greater than the old BSD-based SunOS code. (Hate to say it, but most OSS projects would have let user code break and told the users it was their problem.)
Compatibility was in fact the whole reason for the Solaris version change that gets so many laughs from younger /. readers, or those who have never used a Sun. The jump from 2.5.1 to 2.6 changed so many things, and caused so many problems for Sun, that starting with 2.6-<2.7 they announced there would never be another incompatible break; never another change deserving of a bump in the major number.
Which, to them at least, meant that the leading "2." was redundant and could be dropped.
You cannot apply a technological solution to a sociological problem. (Edwards' Law)
Actually, that would be "vincis", since "vincere" is third coniugatio (short "e"). "vinces" means "you shall conquer", which is exactly what you would expect from a vision: "In this sign you shall conquer".
My apologies for nitpicking,
Jan-Pascal
(just 5 years of Latin and 3 years of Greek in secondary education)