On Friday, October 24, 2025, David Rowley <
dgrowleyml@gmail.com> wrote:
On Sat, 25 Oct 2025 at 04:51, Adrian Klaver <adrian.klaver@aklaver.com> wrote:
>
> On 10/24/25 08:00, Ron Johnson wrote:
> > On Fri, Oct 24, 2025 at 10:54 AM Adrian Klaver
> > <adrian.klaver@aklaver.com <mailto:adrian.klaver@aklaver.com>> wrote:
>
> > "Never trust a .0 release with important data" is just as true in 2025
> > as it was in 1985.
> >
> > That's a chicken and egg problem, though, isn't it?
>
> There is nothing stopping you from setting up a test instance and
> kicking the tires on a new release to see if your setup will work
> correctly.
I'd say it's exactly that attitude that causes people to think .0
should be avoided. Beta versions are meant for test instances. It'd be
good if people encouraged their use more often rather than pushing
people to defer til GA.
I’d say it’s negativity bias that causes this. Remembering the times serious bugs were discovered in .0-.2 releases strongly leans one to avoid .0-.2 releases. Counteracting that bias with data seems needed. Yes, it would be great if more people tested betas; but there is no way for users to have any idea of how much or how effective such efforts have been for a given release.
If someone comes here asking for advice I’m going to be conservative. The ones who are going to be pushing the envelope or doing beta testing are not asking for this kind of advice. They do it likely to benefit from new features and some subset does it to be the canary for the community because they can handle the rare negative outcome.
David J.
