Where can I get information on QGIS beta versions?

While searching for information on some QGIS functionality on the web, I noticed several times, people using version 1.9, however this version is probably some beta (or so I thought) but I can't seem to find a download/site of it anywhere.

Then, on some other site someone wrote that there is a development version of 1.7.4. Wiki site lists only official versions, but I want to know, is there a site where some beta previews are available?

Google search yields nothing useful under 'qgis beta', 'qgis 1.9'

Answer

Depends on the operating system ...

OSX:

• Nightly builds are available here; they depend on the GDAL_complete and GSL frameworks from Kyngchaos;


• Kyngchaos sometimes has a development version on the site too (but not as of this post).

Ubuntu / Debian Linux:

• Add the 'unstable' PPA to your sources.list and you'll get the latest version available.

Windows:

• The OSGeo4W installer can be used in 'advanced' mode to allow the development versions to be installed.