Quoting Adrian Simmons <adrinux@perlucida.com>:
I've read through all the new release system documentation during updating my theme and I'm still confused, but that's probably because there is no way to pull the latest stable release of a module or theme from CVS right? It now depends entirely on how the maintainer is working?
It has always depended on the maintainer. Contributions are controlled by the maintainer and the maintainer has control of his CVS tags. The powers of Drupal have set forth some guidelines but as long as the contribution is maintained those powers are not going to get their shorts twisted about how the maintainer HEAD, branch and tags are being created; they have better things to take care of, like what is to be included in the next release. Each individual module/theme is in its own right control of its HEAD. If the maintainer chooses not to use it so be it. Open an issue with the module and gripe their where the individual maintainer who isn't doing it like every one else is who needs to here it. That maintainer might not even be reading this list so he won't even know. And, the contributed modules don't even have to use contributions/ CVS at all. The point is contributions are separate entities that have a common interest of Drupal. Together we form a community of cliques. Those cliques often intertwine with one another and sometimes like CCK current intertwines with Drupal core.
I'm beginning to see why so many other projects have 'stable' and 'latest' tags...
Not relative to the conversation. Just a different maintainer controlled method. Earnie