[FreeNX-kNX] Re: nxagent: waiting until ready...

[Gian Filippo Pinzari]

Neal H. Walfield wrote:
> But now that I look at [1] the stable releases are all labelled
> 1.4.0-X or 1.3.X-Y. So, I am clearly confused.  Could you please
> explain to me how the release numbers work or at least how to
> distinguish between snapshots and official releases?

Why are you confused? It depends on what you mean for "stable". All
the versions share the same "major" numbering because they are part
of the same major branch. For example the 1.4.0 components start
with 1.4.0-1 and... Never ends, because there may be further patch
releases after the final. The "stable" releases are those that are
marked as such and officially avertised as "final". All the compo-
nents are developed in parallel. The list of components that become
part of an official release are detailed in the NoMachine Release
Announcement. The list of components constitutes the product baseline
and become the reference for the current product "API". Once offi-
cially released, the component's API remains stable for all the
X.Y.Z's timelife.

It's enough to monitor the NX project to find out which version gets
officially released by NoMachine. Subscribing to the NX Announce
mailing list can also help. All source or binary releases that are
just snaphost are marked as such.

> So there is no more support for 1.3 or desire to stay API compatible
> between major releases?

Projects like NX are a work in progress and have not reached the
level of development required to guarantee a stable API. We care
maintaining the compatibility as long as we need to ensure that
derivative projects, like FreeNX, are not broken by the changes.
Anyway we cannot ensure that any single bit (that we don't even
know it is used) will not change. I'm telling since years that
nxproxy, as it is today, is a temporary and that use of the com-
mand line switches is -strongly discouraged-. There is a (rather
evident) comment in the nxcomp code telling so and, if you had
asked, I would have surely confirmed that.

/Gian Filippo.