[arch-general] How stable are the new version number formats on eg. filesystem, usbutils, etc.

[Rashif Ray Rahman]

On 15 January 2014 07:39, David C. Rankin
<drankinatty at suddenlinkmail.com> wrote:
> All,
>
>   Updating different minimum dependency package version info for tde PKGBUILDs,
> I note there have been a number of 'version number format' changes for various
> packages. E.g.:
>
> filesystem 0.x.y-z ==> 2013.05-2

This has been the format since at least April 2008. [1]

> usbutils 0.x.y-z ==> 006-1

And this since January 2011. [2]

>   There is a big difference going from filesystem>=0.7.3 to filesystem>=2013.
> When I run across packages like this where the version has changed format -- Are
> they likely going to stay with the new format? Or will they likely revert back
> to major.minor-rel numbers at some time?

There is always a reason for the change, enforced by upstream or
necessitated by a move to a different release source (e.g. VCS). I
can't recall filesystem's history, but it might have been due to the
need for a version format that makes sense for such a package.

And the versioned dep you are citing is probably a leftover that got
updated. Anyway, as Daniel already said, changes like this shouldn't
bother you now that epoch is used to force upgrades in the event
vercmp returns negative.

[1] http://goo.gl/AA6Xn9
[2] http://goo.gl/5Dm5k3


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