Epoch Semantic Versioning
If you’ve been following my work in open source, you might have noticed that I have a tendency to stick with zero-major versioning, like v0.x.x. For instance, as of writing this post, the latest version of UnoCSS is v0.65.3, Slidev is v0.50.0, and unplugin-vue-components is v0.28.0. Other projects, such as React Native is on v0.76.5, and sharp is on v0.33.5, also follow this pattern.
People often assume that a zero-major version indicates that the software is not ready for production. However, all of the projects mentioned here are quite stable and production-ready, used by millions of projects.
Version numbers act as snapshots of our codebase, helping us communicate changes effectively. For instance, we can say "it works in v1.3.2, but not in v1.3.3, there might be a regression." This makes it easier for maintainers to locate bugs by comparing the differences between these versions. A version is essentially a marker, a seal of the codebase at a specific point in time.
However, code is complex, and every change involves trade-offs. Describing how a change affects the code can be tricky even with natural language. A version number alone can’t capture all the nuances of a release. That’s why we have changelogs, release notes, and commit messages to provide more context.
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