[openssl-project] A proposal for an updated OpenSSL version scheme (v2)

[Viktor Dukhovni]

> On Sep 21, 2018, at 11:00 AM, Tim Hudson <tjh at cryptsoft.com> wrote:
> 
> If you repeat that in semantic versioning concepts just using the labels for mapping you get:
> - what is the major version number - the answer is clearly "1".
> - what is the minor version number - the answer is clearly "0"
> - what is the fix version number - there is no such thing
> - what is the patch version number - the answer is clearly "2" (reusing the fix version)

I'm afraid that's where you're simply wrong.  Ever since 1.0.0, OpenSSL
has promised (and I think delivered) ABI stability for the *minor* version
and feature stability (bug fixes only) for the patch letters.  Therefore,
the semantic version number of "1.0.2a" is "1.0", its minor number is 2
and its fix number is 1 ("a").

Now of course "1.0" is not a valid semantic version number, but fortunately,
we've since released "1.1" and are now considering "1.2" which with semantic
versioning, is ready to become simply "2" as the "1." prefix is not needed,
and "2" is conveniently larger than the current "not-really major" leading "1".

> Effectively the current "minor" version disappears. 

No, effectively the current "major" number disappears, with the minor
assuming the major role it already had.

-- 
	Viktor.