Disclaimer: I'm not judging the way things are done in Oak and I'm not
trying to imply that it's bad or wrong. The following is just an
observation.

The development model of Oak is currently setup in a way which makes it
impossible to do semantic versioning of the API. The main reason is that
the branches are not just maintenance branches but also features are
backported to the branches. And the way this is done also means that the
API on such a branch could be "different" to the main branch and evolve
differently. Which in consequence means it's not compatible anymore
(things added to the branch might evolve differently on the main branch
- this might be more theory than practice, but it can happen).

Therefore, with the current way of doing development in Oak, semantic
versioning is not possible. Period.

You have two options: provide meaning to the API versions (which means
changing the way development is done in general), or stick to the
current way and clearly state that there is no semantic versioning.

Everything else would be a fake compromise which would be totally
confusing and misleading.

Again, I'm not arguing for one or the other - just stating the options.
 
Carsten
-- 
Carsten Ziegeler
Adobe Research Switzerland
[email protected]

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