Explaining version numbers

You see them everywhere but what exactly do they mean. Version numbers may seem cryptic but in actual fact the concept is rather simple, during this post I will explain how to read a Venasoft version number and what the constraints are.Our version numbers are limited to a maximum of 131070, this number must be spread over 4 version fields, we will call these fields; Version Components.

Each component has a name:

  • Major
  • Minor
  • Build
  • Build Revision

The major component is used to communicate that the product in question is a major release; the release may have compatibility issues with previous releases of a lesser major version number.

The minor component is used to communicate that the product in question still has the same core, but may have different functionality to releases that share the same major version number before it.

The build component is used by developers during the construction of the product; higher build numbers tell the developer when the product was built because the major, minor and minor revision numbers remain static during the development phase.

The build revision component is incremented during the products support lifetime cycle by hot fixes and patches to the product after the final build, because the build number remains static after release and is only incremented during the development of the next release.

For more information on build numbers and build revision numbers see Explaining the version control system and build numbers.

Now as mentioned before, or version numbers are limited to a maximum value of 131070, and the components must not exceed this number when they are added together.

To help explain this further I refer to the representation below:

[Major] . [Minor] . [Build] . [Build Revision]
[128] + [128] + [31600] + [99214]

This represents the constraints of each component, Major is limited to a maximum value of 128, Minor is limited to a maximum value of 128, Build is limited to a maximum value of 31600 and Build Revision is limited to 99214.

To look at the maximum possible version number it would look like this 128.128.31600.99214.

I hope this will help those interested in the future to read our version numbers and understand what they mean.