what does this specify about a software product : version w.x.y.z ?

Question

are they based on dates?
or on updates?
or on version release sequence?
what all do the w,x,y,z specify in the version specification?
can we name it in our own way for our product, or has it got a proper meaning?

Answer 1

That the most common software versioning, which different major releases of the software each receive a unique numerical identifier. This is typically expressed as three numbers, separated by periods, such as version 2.4.13. One very commonly followed structure for these numbers is:
major.minor.revision.build
or
major.minor.maintenance.build

I use delphi for versioning, but i dont know about other IDE

Edit
Just found it : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_versioning#Software_versioning_schemes

Answer 2

Normally the version names are given with numbers say 1.0 1.1. 1.2 , 2.0, 2.1, 3.0 etc where the 1 , 2 & 3 denote major changes and the .1 & .2 denote that minor corrections were made on the version. After a few releases just for the sake of sales promotion they might change the name like for example Intel called its processor family with 8086, 80386, 80486 and suddenly they changed the name to Pentium instead of 80586 and then once again named the subsequent versions as pentium I, II III & IV. Thats all with certain reasonability once can coin their version as they like nothing more or nothing less.

Answer 3

It's version numbers. Their broken down by the relative hierarchy of what was upgraded.

Peanut butter sandwich v1.0
v1.1 Crunchy peanut butter
v1.1.1 name brand peanut butter
v2.0 Peanut butter, bacon, and banana sandwich

There's no hard and fast rule. Though a difference between v1.x.x and v2.x.x is usually significant.

There's also v0.1a, v0.1b or something similar for alpha and beta stages.

It's really up to you.