[Freeciv-Dev] Re: (PR#2479) Change version string of development versions

[Jason Dorje Short <vze49r5w@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Reinier Post wrote:
> On Wed, Jan 29, 2003 at 08:10:17AM -0800, Raimar Falke via RT wrote:
> > Another alternative would be to have a file which is committed
> > after/with every normal commit. This file contains something like:
> >
> > #define MASTER_REVISION="$Id 1.45$"
> >
> > and at runtime we build a version string ("1.14.1-45" for example)
> > from this.
> >
> > Reinier: is this possible? How much work required?
>
> It is simple - so simple that I think we can actually rely on its
> correct operation.  But I'm not going to publish the details on RT.
>
> This is a better as it allows shorter version numbers.  Its version
> number would always be x.y where y is autoincremented by every commit.
> And x can be kept identical to the Freeciv patch version number.
> That way a full version can be generated out of it (1.14.1.3766)
> that uniquely identifies the contents of the code base.  That would
> be very useful.
>
> The only technical question is whether multi-file commits should be
> treated as a single one.  (We have looked at this before but I'm not
> sure what the best answer is.  Some clients produce sequences of commits
> on individual files but with the same log message that lists all of them.)
Excellent.  I am all in favor of this.

BTW: it should be 1.14.99, not 1.14.1.

Rather than have the file contain '#define MASTER_REVISION="3766"' I 
think it should just contain '3766'.  We can then do something like
  VERSION_LABEL=`cat master_revision`

in configure.ac.  OTOH this may make the version.h bits harder (if they 
can't rely on the master revision value and AC_SUBST is not possible).
One question: how useful will the version number be?  Would it be more 
useful to have a date, that could be used for cvs up -D?  (The date 
would be that of the CVS repository right after the most recent commit.)
jason