5 ms·

That may seen odd, but it could happen in a open-source world: multiple parties releasing different versions of the same piece of software and calling it the sa

That may seen odd, but it could happen in a open-source world: multiple parties releasing different versions of the same piece of software and calling it the same.

loeg 8y ago
One fun example of this is the so-called RPM "5" fork[0], which is basically dead and almost entirely unused[1]. The result is the main RPM everyone uses will probably stay at version 4.x forever. [0]: http://rpm5.org/ http://rpm5.org/ [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rpm_(software)#RPM_v5 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rpm_(software)#RPM_v5
- nkkollaw 8y ago
  They could skip a version like PHP did. Among other reasons, since books and articles about PHP 6 had already been written long before PHP 5+1 came out, they went with 7.
  - loeg 8y ago
    Sure, they could. I don't think they've felt the need to. RPM tends to change slowly and conservatively.
AdmiralAsshat 8y ago
Isn't it customary to at least rename the fork?
- abjorn 8y ago
  Customary, but unless the name is trademarked, not required.
  - fanf2 8y ago
    Some licences require a change of name for substantial modifications, e.g. the Artistic Licence and Apache Licence v1. But those kinds of clauses are pretty rare nowadays.
simplicio 8y ago
Both Git and Linux are trademarked, presumably to prevent such hijinx
- cesarb 8y ago
  Linux is trademarked because of some "hijinx"... "Initially, nobody registered it, but on August 15, 1994, [...] filed for the trademark Linux, and then demanded royalties from Linux distributors. In 1996, Torvalds and some affected organizations sued him to have the trademark assigned to Torvalds, and, in 1997, the case was settled." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux#Copyright,_trademark_and_naming https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux#Copyright,_trademark_and...