That way your brain can't think of them as numbers any more =)
Versions aren't numbers.
For Virgil, because I am a fan of the roman poet, I am using roman numerals for the major versions and append a monotonically-increasing-regardless-of-major-version "00XXX" build number to that. This ensures they always sort lexicographically.
...until I get to version IX, i.e. 9, which would sort incorrectly. So I'll just skip 9, 19, 29...90...heh. :)
Using this precise rule, the starting point that gets you furthest is 250, which grants you 153 elements before stopping at 1038 (MXXXVIII).
It’s possible to devise a longer sequence by skipping some numbers (e.g. after 1000 you’d jump to 1100), but I’m too lazy to calculate how you’d do all that.
All this also assumes subtraction rules, which were a late addition to Roman numerals; without subtraction rules, four is written IIII instead of IV, and nine VIIII instead of IX, and so all of 1–49 would be lexicographically sorted.
from docutils.utils.roman import toRoman
def sequence(start):
last = ''
out = []
for i in range(start, 5000):
this = toRoman(i)
if this > last:
last = this
out.append(i)
return out
# Brute force way because I’m lazy; takes around ten seconds on my machine.
start, s = max(((start, sequence(start)) for start in range(1, 5000)), key=lambda x: len(x[1]))
print(f'{start} gives you {len(s)} items, {s}')
Mathematically 1.2 is greater than 1.18. Yet in versions it is lesser.
I find this annoying and counter intuitive.