[sc34wg3] Version number of the new XTM

[Lars Marius Garshol]

It's been suggested by a couple of people (Murray Altheim as the  
first, I think) that the new XTM version really ought to be called  
XTM 2.0 rather than XTM 1.1. Steve Pepper then started calling it XTM  
2.0, and a number of people appear to have picked it up since.

The arguments for using 2.0 (as given by Steve) were that:

  - we've made radical changes, and

  - 1.1 implies that there might be more changes (a 1.2), whereas 2.0
    sounds more final.

Personally, I'm quite torn on this. The changes don't really seem  
very radical to me, since the underlying model has remained pretty  
much the same since XTM 1.0. However, Dmitry has argued that adding  
typed names, embedded XML, and datatypes is actually not just small  
change, and that reminds me that we also did other things that nobody  
really knows whether are model changes compared to XTM 1.0. So that  
argument might not be so strong.

The other reason for choosing 1.1, in my mind, is that I've always  
considered stability in the base standard to be a key concern. It  
seemed to me that we really ought not to give the impression that  
we're making radical changes. It certainly seems strange to at the  
end of a five-year process suddenly up the version number.

The reason I'm torn is that most people seem perfectly content with  
the 2.0 version number. And since the number really has no  
significance for anything besides marketing how people perceive it is  
really the only thing that matters.

In other words, if there's anyone who really prefers 1.1, speak up  
now. If you don't, the next version will be called 2.0.

--
Lars Marius Garshol, Ontopian               http://www.ontopia.net
+47 98 21 55 50                             http://www.garshol.priv.no