beta

Can some explain to me what beta is all about?

Lee

 

in reference to what?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beta

 

Alpha - Full development stage. Most of phased developments added. Still bugs to be dealt with.

Beta - Phased development completed. Most bugs dealt with. Testing cycle

gamma - release cycle. Testing and minor bug fixing. All major bugs dealt with.

Stable/Release. Development/Testing cut off. All new development on next release candidate.


A lot of development now have RC - release cycles to replace gamma releases. e.g php now at 5.2.5rc1. Also only major releases go through alpha/beta. Sub-releases generally go through beta/gamma/rc

Google were in 'beta' stage for a long time, which in reality was post-gamma, but was still having lots of production ready things added to it so they used beta because it sounded like they were doing something.

Funny really, I was shocked at my last job when the development manager didn't know there was a gamma stage!

S

 

Alot of companies including Nomient talk about beta....is it a programming language?

Lee

 

No it just means the last testing phase before the product is rolled out, e.g. if I was to create a piece of software, I would want to make sure it worked an had no bugs in it, so I would release a beta version, people or companies testing it for me would be beta testers.

When I had feedback from the beta testers I would fix any problems etc then release a final version.

hope this helps.

 

e.g The EPP is at beta stage at the moment with registrars using a non-production testbed.

It's just a phase we're going through. Sometime's life's a bit beta!

S

 

wiki wicked

two good wiki wicked explanations...now me, a non techie, knows! At least we ain't going back to betamax then...LOL

See me thread re selling your domain names at 100% or more uplift in values

Lee