Support versioning librarys via semver

[FWeinb]

For proper versioning adapting semver would be great. Currently it looks like the commit hash is used to identify the version of a library.

I think this would greatly improve the ecosystem for using third-party libraries with platformio.

[marvinroger]

This should apply to both library.json and platformio.ini, right? What about doing it like so:

• 1.2.3 would match exactly 1.2.3
• ~1.2.3 would match 1.2.x
• ^1.2.3 would match 1.x.x

This is the npm way of doing semversionning, and this is pretty clean and straightforward, I think.

[ivankravets]

@marvinroger Sure, see #410 (comment) and semver.

[marvinroger]

Well, I am commenting on #410... But the semver spec doesn't actually define range specifiers.

[ivankravets]

Opss... Sorry. See what do we have in Python world: https://pypi.python.org/pypi?%3Aaction=search&term=semver&submit=search

Which package do you recommend?

[marvinroger]

No problem!

The thing is semver is not MAJOR.MINOR.FIX, it is BREAKING.FEATURE.FIX, so most people will want to match 1.x.x, so their code benefits from new features and patches, without breaking changes.

The semver package provides these specifiers : <, >, ==, <= and >=, and its function to check if a version match against a range can only check one specifier at a time. So the end user would have to set >=1.0.0 <2.0.0, and you would have to split this string on spaces, check if all specifiers match for every version registered on the server, and return the highest matching version. Painful, both to you and the end user.

node-semver on the other hand, is way easier to deal with. It supports multiple specifiers, and the end user can use <, >, ==, <= and >=, but also -, x, *, ^ and ~. In other words, to express the above need, the end user could set:

• >=1.0.0 <2.0.0
• 1.x.x or 1.*.* or event lighter : 1.x, or 1
• ^1.0.0

More info on node-semver

And the code looks like:

from semver import max_satisfying

versions = ['1.2.3', '1.2.4', '1.2.5', '1.2.6', '2.0.1']
range_ = '^1.0.0'
assert max_satisfying(versions, range_) == '1.2.6'

So I'd definitely recommend node-semver. Easier for everyone!

[ivankravets]

I got you. I mean that I'm not ready to use package which was updated "2014-06-01". Need to contact with @podhmo and ask him will he support it in future.

python-semver by @k-bx looks as active project.

[k-bx]

if you want >=1.0.0 && < 2 you just do:

>>> import semver
>>> ver = "3.2.1"
>>> semver.match(ver, ">=1.0.0") and semver.match(ver, "<2.0.0")
False
>>> ver = "1.2.3"
>>> semver.match(ver, ">=1.0.0") and semver.match(ver, "<2.0.0")
True

[ivankravets]

@k-bx, looks like people like node-semver semantic. I use both of them: generic "semver" for Python-based projects and "node-semver" for Web-projects. "node-semver" is more shorter, but requires knowledges to understand "what does it mean?". As result, generic "semver" is more clear but requires additional condition. >=1.0.0 <2.0.0 vs ^1.0.0.

Proceed from that, I prefer to use generic semver. PlatformIO community consists from different people beginning from students who are not familiar with semver at whole and ending with different developers (C, JAVA, Python, Web, etc.)/system administrators.

@marvinroger do you have any objections?