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Google started it with Chrome, and Firefox had to adopt it too or look like an also-ran. More info here: https://news.softpedia.com/news/Firefox-to-Copy-Google-Chrom...

Chrome was three years old and on version 10.0 when this was published, and Firefox was on version 4.0 despite a decade of Mozilla legacy. It’s marketing, plain and simple, but I think it was the right decision.

2 comments

I was there when this decision was discussed and made. It was nothing to do with marketing.

The really important decision was to switch to a rapid, time-based release cycle from a traditional long, feature-based release cycle. We wanted to reduce the amount of work that was "fixed in the next release" but not yet shipped to users; to increase our responsiveness, so that if a new feature suddenly became important, we could quickly get it into the hands of users; and to avoid developer issues like schedule chicken and rushing to get not-really-done features into a release because the next release is far away. This change was indeed inspired by Chrome, and it worked well; those goals were achieved.

Then a much less important question was how to do version numbering in a world where you're doing these frequent releases. There is no technical reason why some releases should bump a major version number and others should not; the amount of new features or breaking changes will fluctuate from release to release, but the same kinds of changes are present in every release. It is therefore simpler to just have a uniform numbering scheme so no-one has to decide whether a release should bump the major version number, and users aren't trying to understand the difference between a major version bump and a minor version bump (when there isn't really a meaningful difference).

> There is no technical reason why some releases should bump a major version number and others should not; the amount of new features or breaking changes will fluctuate from release to release

Then why have three parts to the version? You could just have the cycle version based on the schedule and a patch/fix subversion.

ESR releases get minor version bumps. Eg 68.3 got released at the same time as 71.

I don't care either way, but they'll have to switch to something else at some point, cause the numbers will look ridiculous. Firefox 157... Firefox 349... Firefox 1071

Intel's processor names already look ridiculous to me. Core i9-10980XE? Can't say that with a straight face, "normal" people seemed confused way back when Sandy Bridge got released

Considering `less` is at version 551, they still have quite some time left.

They could do like NVIDIA and switch back and forth between two, three, and four digit model numbers every decade or so as the numbering scheme gets stale. I remember having a GeForce2 MX400, then a Ti4600, then a 8600, then a GTS 250, then a GTX 460, then a GTX 970, then a Quadro P4000, and now they seem to go for a hybrid scheme where they have the two-digit "16 series" or "20 series" containing four-digit models like 2080 :p

Why is that a ridiculous name? It's from the Core X family of processors, is an i9 (which generally means more cores and cache than an i7), it's a 10th gen processor, which since 9th gen, also means that it has hyper-threading, as opposed to 9th gen and later i7s), and most importantly, as a product name is unique enough to make it easy to look up the technical specifications.

I feel like consumers are smarter than this? I don't think anyone chooses iOS because it's on version 13 versus Android's version 10.

The difference also becomes less meaningful as the disparity grows. If Chrome is on version 78, and Firefox is on version 6 (or whatever), it's relatively intuitive that "versions" don't mean the same thing between the two. Same with the Playstation 3 versus Xbox 360, really.

Most people probably don't even know what version they're running, anyway.

Consumers are in fact this dumb.

That's why it was the Xbox 360 and not the Xbox 2, because XBox 2 < Playstation 3.

I'm aware that this was Microsoft's original thinking behind the Xbox 360's name, but then they called their next console "Xbox One".

That felt to me like Microsoft deciding that their original concerns had never been legitimate.

"One" instead of "1" suggests unity and oneness, rather than a version number.

I still think it was an awful branding decision, though.

Considering how the PlayStation has dominated the market without messing around with branding like that, it seems like MS dropped the ball by bike-shedding the name instead of nurturing quality content.

<ArmchairExecutive> Personally, I think Microsoft should have put way more effort into polishing their Kinect user experience. The X-bone could have been everything that the Echo/Siri/Google Home ecosystems evolved into if Microsoft had just worked harder on polish up front.

Instead, Microsoft pretty much alienated their core gaming base in order to half-assedly fail at a broader goal. They didn't even manage to push through more than a couple of decent Kinect v2 games </ArmchairExecutive>

PS didn't dominate that generation. It outsold the 360, but only by about 5%.

Ironically the PS 4 did outsell the X1 almost 2:1.

That doesn't hold up because they went Xbox One vs Playstation 4.

At this level, the market demands non-linear value. http://achewood.com/index.php?date=01132006

Same reason it's such a cliché for the fourth movie in a franchise to drop the number and have a subtitle like 'Revolution' or 'Revelation' or 'Revenge'. I assume marketers imagine the public's reaction to a '4' like "Look at you with that new _sequel_. How could you BE so cocky?!"

I don't think anyone chooses iOS because it's on version 13 versus Android's version 10.

Users generally choose the phone, not the OS. And the most popular phones are pretty close on the numbering schemes.

Another example is SSL and TLS. SSL 3.0 was the last version, then TLS 1.0 took over, but a lot of people still thought SSL 3.0 was the latest and best.

Most non IT people I know, use Chrome because "one day it was just there". Installed through some freeware program where they forgot to uncheck a box.

Yeah...people are not that smart.