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Re: Pre-Announcing Emacspeak 97++



Jim Van Zandt writes:
 > 
 > I'm glad to hear about the new release.  
 >
 Yes-- now you can buy some stock:-)
 > Just last weekend I finished and uploaded a Debian package for
 > Emacspeak-5.0.  With that experience fresh in my mind, I have two
 > small requests concerning the new Emacspeak release.
 > 
 > First, please arrange for the .tar file to unpack into a subdirectory,
 > not into the current directory.  For the Debian packaging system, the
 > source .tar file must unpack into a subdirectory.  It is no trouble
 > for me to repeat the tar operation.  That's what I did for 5.0.
 > However, it means that the .tar file I submit to the Debian archives
 > is no longer exactly the same (with the same cryptographic checksum as
 > calculated by md5sum) as what you distribute.  A user cannot verify
 > quite so easily that the file has not been tampered with.
 Okay-- this should be easy for me to do.

 I'll ship you a pre-pre-release sometime in late April so you can
 sanity check to make sure things work fine for your purposes.
 > 
 > Second, please give the new distribution a conventional version number
 > like 5.1 or 6.0.  Debian version numbers follow the upstream
 version
 Emacspeak has always had (and always will have) conventional version
 numbers,
 I maintain the development sources under RCS and there is no way I
 would maintain it as "emacspeak 97".
 You clearly missed the humor in the naming scheme:-)
 > numbers, and the Debian package management system tries to ensure that
 > users do not downgrade packages.  emacspeak-97 is certainly an
 upgrade
 Emacspeak 5.0 released in late 1996 was called Emacspeak 97 --note
 that my pre-release announcement called the new one
 emacspeak-97++
 > of emacspeak-5.0.  However, what are you going to do in three more
 > years?  emacspeak-00 would *not* seem to be an upgrade of
 > emacspeak-97.
 I'll let richer bodies decide that and follow in their prosperous (if
 not eminent ) wake.
 >Yes, a little explanation and manual system
 > administration will handle the issue.  However, for the new user, it
 > is just one more obstacle to overcome.
 I think you're seriously over-reacting. No version of Emacspeak has
 shipped without an RCS version number, and I have no idea what you're
 moaning about.
 > 
 > There is a precedent for nicnames as well as official
 > version numbers.  The last Slackware release was called "Slackware
 > 96", but it also had an official version number of 3.1.  The beta test
 > version has the number 3.2.
 > 
 > Incidently, the Debian package has not shown up on mirrors yet, but I
 > think it was in time to be included in the next official release,
 > which will be Debian 1.3.
 > 
 >                                - Jim Van Zandt
And as I point out, Emacspeak has maintained this tradition of
nicknames and true version numbers.
 Thanks, 
 --Raman

-- 
Best Regards,
--raman

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