Versioning is one of those things that can be done in many different ways. Almost every team I worked with came up with their own versioning schema. When starting a new project, quite often we would spend time debating how we are going to version our releases. And yet, coming up with our own versioning schema is usually a waste of time. The goals of versioning are simple. We need a unique identifier of a release as well as an indication of whether a change breaks backward compatibility. Given that others already agreed on the format that fulfills those objectives, the best we can do, just as with many other things related to software development, is to use the convention. Otherwise, we are probably wasting our time reinventing the wheel without understanding that a few things are likely going to go wrong down the line.
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