Haze indeed that would be interesting.
MAME 2.0.
Since it didn't happen, then release number would be enough to be used a version number (in other words indeed to drop "0.").
Going for a date version (as Dullaron suggests), although I personally do it in my own projects (but YYMMDD so there is proper sorting), I don't think it fits MAME.
Going for "MAME 176" makes more sense.
While the explanation that "1.0 represents all electronic devices, even those not yet made" also has a point, this thing probably started for other reasons. That nobody bothered to classify major (to change main version) and minor (to change dot version) changes (so something like MAME 12.45), or even MAME 3.23.12 (milestones/generation changes, major updates, minor updates) or even still include .build number like many projects do, AFTER the version numbers (3.23.12.0175).
This would make the project way more understandable to people that don't follow the project every month. I mean I cannot count the times I explained that between two simple version steps, MAME became from an arcade-only emulator an "everything" emulator. Or when it switched from DOS to Win (and people still tried to run it otherwise), or when it completely switched video subsystem. All this would be more "readable" by more casual users if proper versioning was used.
But all this talk is just casual of course.
Anyway history cannot be unwritten.
If I could propose something, I would just propose some time to move to the simple "drop 0." era.
After all MAME versioning changed so many times already.
Last edited by NLS; 07/25/16 02:34 PM.
