Terms Governing Template Versioning Habit
The file is called Final_v3_ACTUAL_USE_THIS.docx. There are four files with similar names.
Field Notes: Template Versioning Behavior in the Wild Observed November 2022. Location: Desktop Folder.
Observation Site
The subject's desktop folder contains the following files, all created within a six-week period:
meeting_template.docxmeeting_template_v2.docxmeeting_template_v2_FINAL.docxmeeting_template_v2_FINAL_use_this.docx
A fifth file, meeting_template_v3_ACTUAL_USE_THIS.docx, was created two days before these notes were compiled. It has been used once.
Origin Conditions
The original template was created for recurring use. It was adequate. Two weeks later, the subject revised it. The revision improved one section and introduced an ambiguity in another. The ambiguity was noted and a second revision was created. The second revision was saved under a new name because overwriting the previous version felt like a risk.
Each name represents a moment when the file felt finished, followed by a moment when it did not.
Behavioral Pattern
The versioning strategy in use is manual, additive, and confidence-based. A new file is created whenever the subject is uncertain whether the current version is an improvement over the previous one. The naming convention communicates this uncertainty to no one, since the subject is the only user of the template, but it communicates it persistently and with escalating emphasis.
The word FINAL has appeared in three filenames. None of them was final.
Why Version Control Is Not in Use
Version control is available and familiar. The subject uses it professionally. The template is a single document in a desktop folder, not a repository. Setting up a repository for a meeting template was evaluated and judged disproportionate. This judgment is defensible. It is also the condition that produced four files with FINAL in the name.
The Governing Rule
The versioning system is a record of uncertainty about which version was good, not a record of version history. A version control system records what changed. This system records how the subject felt about the file at the moment of saving, encoded in suffix text that becomes ambiguous within weeks.
The suffix ACTUAL_USE_THIS was written in good faith. It is now the least reliable part of the filename.
Consequence
Eventually template versioning habit acquires an unwritten enforcement system that everyone denies creating. The subject now pauses before opening the template folder and selects the most recently modified file by date rather than by name. The naming information is no longer the primary navigation mechanism. The files remain anyway.
Assessment
The system works. The system is also slightly chaotic. Both are true. The sympathy here is not withheld.