I'm using Firefox 5 right now, I don't feel any difference from Firefox 4.
That's exactly the point. Which version of Gmail are we on right now? 477? Does that feel different from 476? I don't know. I just get performance improvements and new features as they come out.
The problem with using that metric is that the "feel" of a program is directly related to the UI changes that the version employs. You could change absolutely nothing bug and feature wise, but do a UI redesign and the new version would feel like it was updated a whole bunch.
What's wrong with subversion system for bug fixes? So, you mean they fixed so many bugs, improved so many back-end features in Firefox 4, which perfectly justifies a version jump from 4 to 7? I seem to remember old days Firefox 2 to Firefox 3 took forever...
They're not jumping from 4 to 7. 5 has been released; 6 will be released soon; 7 will be released six weeks after that. It's a time-based schedule with a new version number every six weeks.
Mozilla was sick of defining features for a given version and then delaying releases for months because of too-ambitious goals, so they switched to a whatever-is-done-by-the-deadline system. Version numbers aren't particularly meaningful.
Which is why I like Ubuntu's YY.MM versioning - it's completely natural and expected.
I also like build numbers like Microsoft and Apple give, you know if OSX 10.7 GM seed is different from the GA release by looking at the build (e.g. 11A494A)
Clearly, they are pulling the old "major version change marketing stunt" to catch up with a perceived lag in version numbers compared to other browsers. You see, apparently people think IE 9 must be vastly superior to FF 4...
Personally, I think the time for version numbers should probably be over altogether. At this point I feel it's more productive to just tack a date string onto the thing and be done with it. For example, Firefox 2011-July is way more informative than an actual version number.
Did you read Mozilla's version number announcement a few months back? Version numbers aren't being used in marketing material anymore, so the user will rarely see them. The change in the version numbering corresponds to a new rapid release/update cycle. From the user's perspective, there are no versions, there is just Firefox.
I didn't read it, no. But looking at the website and the actual Firefox app right now, version numbers are still a big part of the picture. A release cycle doesn't become more rapid just because they're using major version numbers in place of minor ones. I get and support the idea behind a rapid release mechanism instead of holding back a release in order to wait on incomplete features, but still this version number thing seems like a stunt to me that has little to do with the actual release policy.
That's exactly the point. Which version of Gmail are we on right now? 477? Does that feel different from 476? I don't know. I just get performance improvements and new features as they come out.