Documentation/4.8/Developers/Versioning
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Versioning
Project fork
While Slicer specific patches related to dependent project (i.e. VTK) are integrated upstream, it is not uncommon to build Slicer against a Slicer specific fork of the project.
For example: https://github.com/Slicer/VTK
Patches for tagged release
For each version of the project requiring some specific patches, a branch following that convention will be created: slicer-vX.Y.Z-YEAR-MONTH-DAY
where
X.Y.Z
corresponds to the version of the fork projectYEAR-MONTH-DAY
corresponds to the date of the last official commit of the fork project.
For example, in case of the Slicer/VTK fork, the branch slicer-v6.2.0-2015-03-02
has been created.
Patches for development branch
In this case, since there is no tag associated with the branch, the Slicer specific patch should be added to a branch named using the date of the commit parent of the Slicer branch: slicer-vX.Y-YEAR-MONTH-DAY-REV
where
X.Y
corresponds to the fork releaseREV
corresponds to either the first 7 chars of git hash or SVN revision (for exampler1234
)YEAR-MONTH-DAY
corresponds to the date of the last official commit of the fork project
For example: slicer-v6.2.0-2015-02-24-70bad0e
Adding patches to the fork
When adding new patches to the fork, prefer direct commits or cherry-picked commits over merge commits. Avoiding merge commits makes it easier to rebase the fork against a new upstream revision.
Commit message
The following command should be used to list changes:
git shortlog sha_before..sha_after --no-merges
where sha_before
and sha_after
are the first seven charachers of the SHA.
Here is an example of commit updating External_VTKv6.cmake
in Slicer:
ENH: Update VTK to handle default values for array parameters in python Without this commit, one must specify parameters like (,int array[3]=0) when the method is called from python. $ git shortlog 1c30cb0..4b9957b --no-merges David Gobbi (2): Fix wrapping pointer parameters with default value 0. Handle default values for array parameters in python.
Source: r25160
Caveats
- For the commit title, prefer something like
ENH: Update VTK to ...
instead ofENH: Update VTK git tag to ...
- If there is only commit in the update, it is reasonable to copy the message. For example, see r24693.
- If the copied message reference the sha1 of its project (e.g VTK), change it to this form
org/proj@sha
. For example, see r24693.
- If there is a long list of changes return by
git shortlog
, make sure to copy the full list. Before the list, consider also adding a short summary of the "interesting" changes. For example, see r25068
Slicer Package naming scheme
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The following information is for Slicer maintainers only |
Slicer-<MAJOR_VERSION>.<MINOR_VERSION>.<PATCH_VERSION>[-rc{1|2|3...}][-<TWEAK_VERSION>][-<DATE>][-svn<REV>][-dirty]-<ARCH>-<PLATFORM>
There are 2 types of builds, releases and developments:
- Release
- Special builds made on a given revision (e.g. r19033: "ENH: Slicer 4.0.1")
- Don't contain date or revision number.
- The optional suffix -rc{1|2|3|...} identifies the release candidates leading to a final release.
- Eventually, a tweak number can be added (e.g. 4.0.1-1)
- Development
- Nightly or experimental builds
- Contains suffixes after the major.minor.patch version
- The suffix svn<REV> allows to identify the revision associated with the current package.
- The -dirty prefix indicates if the package has been generated from a locally modified source tree.
Example of linux 64bits packages
Proposal #1
Include revision number in package name
File name | date | build type | note |
---|---|---|---|
Slicer-4.0.0-linux-amd64 | 2011-11-24 | release | release of Slicer 4.0.0 |
Slicer-4.0.0-2011-12-10-svn100-linux-amd64 | 2011-11-25 | development | nightly build after 4.0.0 |
Slicer-4.0.1-rc1-linux-amd64 | 2012-01-04 | release | release candidate 1 of Slicer 4.0.1 |
Slicer-4.0.1-rc1-2012-01-05-svn150-linux-amd64 | 2012-01-05 | development | nightly build after the release candidate |
Slicer-4.0.1-rc2-linux-amd64 | 2012-01-11 | release | release candidate 2 of Slicer 4.0.1 |
Slicer-4.0.1-rc2-2012-01-12-svn200-linux-amd64 | 2012-01-12 | development | nightly build after the release candidate |
Slicer-4.0.1-linux-amd64 | 2012-01-14 | release | release of Slicer 4.0.1 |
Slicer-4.0.1-2012-01-20-svn236-linux-amd64 | 2012-01-20 | development | nightly build after 4.0.1 |
Slicer-4.0.1-1-linux-amd64 | 2012-01-28 | release | tweak version 1 of Slicer 4.0.1 |
Slicer-4.0.2-linux.amd64 | 2012-06-05 | release | release of Slicer 4.0.2 |
Proposal #2
- Increment minor version after each release, remove the concept of release candidate and tweak version.
- With the transition to git workflow where branching is easier, after each release, the minor version in the trunk would be increased by one.
- Patch release would be done using the maintenance branch associated with any given release.
File name | date | build type | branch | note |
---|---|---|---|---|
Slicer-4.5.0-1-linux-amd64 | 2015-12-11 | release | 4.5 | tweak version 1 of Slicer 4.5.0 |
Slicer-4.6.0-2016-01-30-svn24950-linux-amd64 | 2016-01-30 | development | master | nightly build after 4.5.0 |
... | ... | ... | ... | ... |
Slicer-4.6.0-2016-02-06-svn25174-linux-amd64 | 2016-02-06 | development | master | nightly build after 4.5.0 |
Slicer-4.5.1-2016-02-06-svn25175-linux-amd64 | 2016-02-06 | development | 4.5 | manual build after 4.5.0-1 |
Slicer-4.5.1-linux-amd64 | 2015-02-07 | release | 4.5 | patch version 1 of Slicer 4.5.0 |
... | ... | ... | ... | ... |
Slicer-4.6.0-2016-03-05-svn25174-linux-amd64 | 2016-02-05 | development | master | nightly build after 4.5.0 |
Slicer-4.6.0-linux-amd64 | 2016-03-06 | release | master | release of 4.6.0 :
|
... | ... | ... | ... | ... |
Slicer-4.6.0-2016-03-07-svn25180-linux-amd64 | 2016-03-07 | development | master | nightly build after 4.6.0 |
Proposal #3
- Package name remains unchanged: Slicer-X.Y.Z[-YYYY-MM-DD]-<arch>.<ext>
- Development build will end with an "odd" number
- For example: 4.7, 4.9, 5.1, 5.3
- Package name include the date: Slicer-X.Y.Z[-YYYY-MM-DD].<ext>
- Stable release will end with an "even" number
- For example: 4.8, 5.0, 5.2
- Package name do not include the date: Slicer-X.Y.Z.<ext>
- Install folder:
- windows: Slicer X.Y.Z-YYYY-MM-DD (remains the same)
- macOS: Slicer.app -> Slicer-X.Y.Z-YYYY-MM-DD.app (add revision and date)
- Linux: Slicer-X.Y.Z[-YYYY-MM-DD]-<arch> (remains the same)
Why ?
- Slicer is "released" daily (aka nightly build) and mixing these daily releases with stable releases under the same major.minor revision would be confusing for the users. We cannot expect users to learn different naming patterns to determine what kind of release (development/stable) they are installing and learning a complex logic of determining which version is more recent (e.g., which one is more recent 4.7.1-1 or 4.7.0-2017-08-29).
- With this new scheme in place, we can unambiguously specify both stable/development branch and a specific version. This allows using simple major.minor tags in Mantis, documentation, forums, etc.
- It will be possible to distinguish between the pre- and the post- release. When we mention 4.8, it clearly relates to a version that contain all changes of 4.7.
- Semantic versioning not applicable to a complex application, maintaining backward compatibility is done as a best effort and often "minor" breaking changes are included after communicating with users or updating the user code.
Extension package - Naming scheme
- Create
Extensions-XYZ-Nightly
andExtensions-XYZ-Continuous
tracks on CDash