We build and release software by massively consuming and producing software packages such as npms, RPMs, Rubygems, etc.
Each package manager, platform, type or ecosystem has its own conventions and protocols to identify, locate and provision software packages. And another set of conventions to define dependent version ranges and how to compare two package versions.
When tools, APIs and databases process or store multiple package types, it is difficult to reference the same software package across tools in a uniform way. This is a problem that Package-URL (PURL) tries to solve.
The problem of versions and version ranges is what this Version Range Specifier (VERS) tries to solve. VERS grew from PURL and complements PURL.
The VERS specification consists of a core syntax definition and versioning scheme definitions stored in a single document:
- VERS core: Defines the format, syntax, and rules used to represent and validate VERS.
And of a collection of JSON test data stored in the tests/ directory
See the dedicated adopters list.
This document is licensed under the MIT license