Hello,
Over the years there have been many proposals regarding the versioning
of CloudStack. The biggest hurdle has been the "4" as a prefix, which is
useless at the moment.
I've looked up many of the proposals and discussions (see below), but
none of them went anywhere, they silently died. I want this to change.
Ubuntu and Apple us a versioning system where they prefix with the year,
in 2026 this is "26" and next year it will be "27".
Proposal in the past where to drop the "4" and that would be 20 in the
4.20 era (2024!!) and this would now be "24" as we are approaching
version 4.24.
I think this would be the easiest change by making our next release "25"
and not 4.25 anymore, with one note: 25 is very close to (20)27 and it
might be better to jump from 25 to 27 as our next release will be in
2027 after we release 4.24.
We can go over many details, but in general I'd like to get consensus
and get things moving on this topic.
Any major objections before I start a VOTE? The VOTE would be that there
will be no 4.25 in 2027, but we will have version "27".
Thanks,
Wido
<2024
- Jun 2016 - [DISCUSS] 5.0.0 and 6.0.0 (John Burwell): 5.0 for cruft
removal/breaking refactors, 6.0 for architectural redesign.
https://lists.apache.org/thread/lcmvvyy098oo07rxzf8gzk56oz1lns95
- Jan 2019 - Why CloudStack 5 (Ivan Kudryavtsev): no radical change to
justify a "5"; if it is marketing, just drop the leading "4.".
https://lists.apache.org/thread/lwlxs8xgz4glocctf7dv89k5nqqsxmlb
2024
- Jan 2024 - [PROPOSAL] version naming : drop the 4. (Daan): the second
digit is de facto the major. Variants raised: 5.0, 20.0, and
Ubuntu-style YYYY.MM.
https://lists.apache.org/thread/lh45w55c3jmhm7w2w0xgdvlw78pd4p87
- Jan 2024 - [VOTE] drop first version number and continue with semantic
versioning: closed same day, no conclusion, more discussion requested.
https://lists.apache.org/thread/59m575f9vcvl8gdj9c9v5336gmj3v330
- Feb 2024 - [VOTE] next version 20 instead of 4.20: several +1, but
blocked. Paul Angus -1 (vote conflated dropping the 4 with adopting
semver; digit semantics undefined). Guto -1 from the other side (only
worthwhile if it comes with a breaking-change mechanism). No result.
https://lists.apache.org/thread/4zs8d15ghvvwwro46ry5zjf8fn8x0t88
- Mar 2024 - Joao's alternative: keep X.Y.Z.N with a fixed cadence
(major/2y, minor/6m, patch/2-3m, N for security).
https://lists.apache.org/thread/o6o9h3qp8gqrpq4v7o81tl6vp51tkjhg
https://github.com/apache/cloudstack/discussions/8970
- Dec 2024 - CloudStack 5? (Rene Moser): reopened the same question.
https://lists.apache.org/thread/hnzp6hnsjyj8593cf6tbgryt1s8z5glq
2025
- Apr 2025 - [Discussion] Versioning (Joao): three rules proposed -
API-breaking changes, DB schema changes and feature removal only in
major versions; naming to be voted separately.
https://lists.apache.org/thread/4jk31krsjl8cbp5n8wbt7ypwl65g364j
- May 2025 - [VOTE] Versioning process: not carried. Daan -0 pending
exceptions (hypervisor support, security releases); Rohit -1 (binding)
mainly on restricting DB schema changes to majors, while being
supportive of dropping the "4." itself.
https://lists.apache.org/thread/wf8910ln7wqn9g535ob0n04docbn2jzd
- Sep 2025 - [LTS] Extend LTS support to 24 months: adjacent, explicitly
scoped away from the versioning scheme.
https://lists.apache.org/thread/fkl74js7vxml9c29jqmhl2ctsxsq868o
