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Cover image for What is Semantic Versioning and why you should use it for your software ?
Zied Ghalleb
Zied Ghalleb

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What is Semantic Versioning and why you should use it for your software ?

Introduction

Have you ever wonder why software have those strange numbers attached to them like 1.0.0 ? Well, that's how we use versioning.

Let's break these numbers down:

πŸŽ‰ Major version (left side number): When you have a version changed from 1.0.0 to 2.0.0, this means there is an incompatible change or breaking change.
πŸ”§ Minor version (middle number): When you have a version changed from 1.0.0 to 1.1.0, this means there is a new feature backward compatible.
🩹 Patch version (right side number): When you have a version changed from 1.0.0 to 1.0.1, this means there is a fix to a tiny bug or issue.

Why it's essential:

πŸŒͺ️ It helps avoid chaos by giving you a clear way to track changes and upgrade
🀝 It helps everyone on the team be on the same page
πŸ› It helps teams fix issues and glitches without creating a whole new app
🌟 It helps showing new cool features
⏰ It helps going back to older versions if something goes wrong with last change

In conclusion, versioning is a crucial aspect of software development, ensuring order, collaboration and efficient management of code evolution.

For a more detailed and comprehensive guide on semantic versioning, visit https://semver.org

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