> Minor vs. patch releases are absolutely distinguishable because authors did say so, but changes are not---unless you actually try to use new features.
I'm not understanding, sorry. There are changes that fit in minor that don't in patch - they're not equivalent. I think we have crossed wires somewhere on this point.
> Semver's unclear distinction between minor vs. patch versions is also visible from the coexistence of "caret" requirements and "tilde" requirements in many semver-enabled systems. The former can upgrade to any minor versions, while the latter won't if the required version is specified in the full three-part form. Which one should I use? Depends on packages? Is that any different from having a different versioning scheme per package?
Tilde is "this patch and above don't go to a new minor version". Caret is the same but allows minor upgrades.
Which you use depends on your project and testing, and yeah you can base it on what the maintainer is like. Some projects break all the time and you don't want even patch releases. I'm not really sure why they added those tbh I'd prefer just ranges. They're just shorthand for ranges anyway.
Again, it's about communication. Some people being bad at communicating or maintaining software doesn't make communication pointless.
It brings the problem down to one versioning scheme, which you can rely on to different degrees. The overrides are then significantly more contained than having scores of various different things with formats that require different parsing despite looking identical. You instead have one thing and if you're unlucky you have a misbehaving package in your dependencies.
> Deprecations are not breaking changes, so it shouldn't matter anyway.
Yes, which is why it isn't a major change. This is all about the maintainer communicating with you that this is more than a patch
> Also, consider the case where x.y.0 has introduced a new feature I need and also a new shiny bug. Obviously I can't no longer downgrade and semver offers no other solution.
Semver doesn't fix bugs no, but I don't understand the problem you're describing. That would be followed by a patch release with the same minor versions number right?
How does semver make any claims to prevent bugs being introduced?
If it's a local change you make would you have a distinct package? If you want to have the same package name just make a patch number yourself and mark it pre-release. That's literally what it is right - a patch that's not yet released.
I'm not understanding, sorry. There are changes that fit in minor that don't in patch - they're not equivalent. I think we have crossed wires somewhere on this point.
> Semver's unclear distinction between minor vs. patch versions is also visible from the coexistence of "caret" requirements and "tilde" requirements in many semver-enabled systems. The former can upgrade to any minor versions, while the latter won't if the required version is specified in the full three-part form. Which one should I use? Depends on packages? Is that any different from having a different versioning scheme per package?
Tilde is "this patch and above don't go to a new minor version". Caret is the same but allows minor upgrades.
Which you use depends on your project and testing, and yeah you can base it on what the maintainer is like. Some projects break all the time and you don't want even patch releases. I'm not really sure why they added those tbh I'd prefer just ranges. They're just shorthand for ranges anyway.
Again, it's about communication. Some people being bad at communicating or maintaining software doesn't make communication pointless.
It brings the problem down to one versioning scheme, which you can rely on to different degrees. The overrides are then significantly more contained than having scores of various different things with formats that require different parsing despite looking identical. You instead have one thing and if you're unlucky you have a misbehaving package in your dependencies.
> Deprecations are not breaking changes, so it shouldn't matter anyway.
Yes, which is why it isn't a major change. This is all about the maintainer communicating with you that this is more than a patch
> Also, consider the case where x.y.0 has introduced a new feature I need and also a new shiny bug. Obviously I can't no longer downgrade and semver offers no other solution.
Semver doesn't fix bugs no, but I don't understand the problem you're describing. That would be followed by a patch release with the same minor versions number right?
How does semver make any claims to prevent bugs being introduced?
If it's a local change you make would you have a distinct package? If you want to have the same package name just make a patch number yourself and mark it pre-release. That's literally what it is right - a patch that's not yet released.