One last question for now...'Hardened'? You've gone
into the realms
of the unknown there. Can you expand on it for me :-) please?
think of it a bit like this (and for god's sake don't quote me here..
i haven't gone near linux dev for ages!)
pre-alpha = pre-dev
alpha, beta = testing
release-stable = pretty well tested, working flawlessly...
hardened = very well tested, secure as it really gets...
here's a wikipedia article on life cycles... if you wanted a more in
depth description
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_release_life_cycle