Versions

From eg

This is a wiki-like feature of user interfaces.

All wikis store previous versions, older versions or other versions of wiki pages. In mediawiki this is called the history (meaning page history - see mediawiki gronks), and in some other wikis just "versions".

[edit] "history" versus "versions"

The page history (mediawiki) or other versions of a page are displayed by all legitimate wiki software by default, usually via a tab beside the edit tab.

While abuse of the term history is a problem, it is technically correct that the page has had a series of events associated with it, which is part of history in the general sense. While other versions or older versions avoid the implication that the history is what matters and encourage consultation of those versions, and may allow also for tracking parallel pages on other wikis in the same history, it remains also possible for history other than changes or reverts of "versions" to be part of a page history. For instance, a troll war on some other page may legitimately be part of a page's history and influences, though it isn't attached to any single version. However, living ontology follows the Microsoft term in this case since it matches much other software, and retrieving prior versions is the dominant use of this feature, and since an individual version is a better description of what is being retrieved than anything else.

[edit] Windows Vista

Under Windows Vista Business and Ultimate, "you can use the Previous Versions tab on the Properties dialog box for that file or folder" to retrieve any previous versions of a file. "This tab contains files from backups and from restore points, which are created automatically by the Shadow Copy feature when you have System Restore enabled for a given drive." Though this feature is intended for system restore, it works on "a drive that contains only data too. On Home Basic and Premium editions, the previous Versions feature isn't available and your backed-up files are available only from the Backup program."