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Microsoft is referring to their upcoming version of SQL Server as "vNext".

Should we add ?

I think the transient nature of the word "next" indicates this would be a bad candidate tag since questions tagged with it will eventually not actually refer to the new "vNext".

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No new tag.

There will be too few questions with lasting value to make this tag worthwhile.

'Next version' is a moving target (even more so these days, given Microsoft's rapid development cycle), and questions would still need to specify the exact CTP/RC/build number.

The questions and answers are likely to go out of date pretty quickly. Questions for full releases have lasting value, even after Microsoft support ends.

This is not true for e.g. 'SQL Server v.Next CTP 1.1.5 (March 2017)'. Once a CTP/RC has been superseded, almost no one will ever need that information again.

Let's do nothing here.

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  • By the way, Microsoft is not the only vendor that uses "vNext" for the in-the-works versions of their software, so the tag would need to be more specific.
    – mustaccio
    Jan 17, 2017 at 20:53
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I'm not sure it makes sense to add a tag specifically for that, since as you say those things will eventually not refer to the "next" version. And a generic thing like has maintenance issues as well, since issues in a beta might persist into release, and eventually there will be a new beta.

I think if anything it should be and then when the official name is announced we can do the swap/synonym thing and update it to reflect the real name. But then we can only do that once unless we really burninate the vnext tag before it gets reused. (And I'm not sure it will - the whole vNext vs. v.Next thing caused them a lot of strife.)

But I kind of feel like we don't need a tag for this at all. It can wait until the official name is announced, IMHO.

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  • I think it's better like sql-server-vnext myself, with an alias from vnext to that. It's pretty deep marketing wank and I don't see anything colliding with vnext for the foreseeable future.
    – Evan Carroll
    Jan 13, 2017 at 18:15
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    I think waiting is even more prudent considering ASP.NET was vNext before it became Core.
    – Erik
    Jan 13, 2017 at 21:52
  • We can rename it later. no point in waiting.
    – Evan Carroll
    Jan 16, 2017 at 4:23
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    @evan what is the point of rushing the tag in? How many questions have you seen involving vNext? 1? 2?
    – Aaron Bertrand Staff
    Jan 16, 2017 at 4:38
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The next version of SQL Server is always labeled "vNext", so a tag saying that would be of little use - as Aaron already stated it is also a tag maintenance nightmare.

Since the release cycle for SQL Server is roughly 18 months, you're going to have a "vNext" change about that often. Does anyone know what the codename for 2016 was? It was called SQL Server 2016 (arguably you'll see references to 2015) and at one point was called.... "vNext".

If anything, choose a common value such as the major version number in the CTP build (aka 12, 13, 14) or the estimated release year given the current cadence (2017, 2018, etc). It would be easier to alias a tag of SQL-Server-2017 to SQL-Server-2018, should the "name" change, rather than re-using generic tags like SQL-Server-vNext.

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  • yes, this. we wouldn't need to alias SQL-Server-2017 to SQL-Server-2018, we could just change it.
    – Jack Douglas
    Jan 15, 2017 at 16:37
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True. But people might start looking for vNext information and until the version is out, what better way to channel the google searches? You could then have a synonym refer to [sql-server-2017nix] or whatever MS comes up with.

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    Perhaps it might be better to add SQL Server vNext to the body of the question if we want to attract Googlers?
    – Hannah Vernon Mod
    Jan 13, 2017 at 15:15
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    Honestly, if people are looking for information about SQL Server on linux, that should be enough. And people will look for SQL Server on linux after the beta is over, too. Similarly if people are looking for specific features only available in vNext, eventually that will be the current version, and later still it will be the previous version. I just sense tag maintenance nightmare for very little benefit.
    – Aaron Bertrand Staff
    Jan 13, 2017 at 15:16

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