[coldtea]

>We have a word that describes that better than 'final': release.

The release would still be 4 even when it's in beta or alpha stage, so no.

[oneplane]

beta would be 4.0.0b or 4.0.0-1 or 4.0.0-BETA. But context is important here; it's not called final because it's the final major 4 version but because this is the 'release' version of major version 4 according to the mailing list.