🚀 same-version

Automatically ensures your software version metadata is consistent across key project files.

📦 What does it do?

same-version checks that software version metadata is consistent across your project files. It can stop GitHub pull requests and local git commits/pushes of projects with inconsistent software version metadata.

Helps ensure:

✅ Reproducibility
✅ Correct citations
✅ Consistent packaging metadata
✅ Accurate DOIs (Zenodo)
✅ Cross-language version consistency (Python / JS / metadata)

It can be used in three ways, each of which have different capabilities:

1️⃣ GitHub Action

Runs in GitHub Actions
Can block:
- Inconsistent pull requests (which helps prevent inconsistent tags and GitHub releases )
Can report (but only after the tag/release has been created):
- Incorrect tags
- Incorrect GitHub releases
Note: GitHub Actions cannot block tags or releases after they have been created.
This workflow runs after the tag or release exists and can report problems, but cannot prevent them from appearing in GitHub UI.

2️⃣ Pre-commit hook

Runs automatically before each commit and push (if enabled)
Can block:
- Inconsistent commits
- Inconsistent tags being pushed

3️⃣ Python CLI

You can run same-version manually from the command line
Useful for:
- Local checks before release
- CI checks outside of GitHub Actions
- Automated scripts

📋 Features

✅ Ultra-conservative version normalization and strict equality comparison using Verple

✅ Compare software version metadata from:

GitHub tag/release
CITATION.cff
pyproject.toml (Python)
setup.py (Python, via static analysis only — no execution)
setup.cfg (Python)
Python files with __version__ assignment (static parsing only — must be assigned directly to a string literal)
codemeta.json (General)
.zenodo.json (General)
package.json (JS/TypeScript)
composer.json (PHP)
Cargo.toml (Rust)
pom.xml (Java)
.nuspec (.NET/C#/NuGet)
DESCRIPTION (R)
ro-crate-metadata.json (RO-Crate)

✅ Cross-language support (e.g., Python, R, JS/TypeScript, Java, Rust, PHP, C#)

✅ Cross-standard support for FAIR and Open Science metadata (e.g., CFF, CodeMeta, RO-Crate, Zenodo)

✅ Lightweight, pure Python — no third-party services

✅ Easy to configure via GitHub Action inputs

✅ Suitable for reproducible research and software citation best practices

✅ Blocks inconsistent GitHub pull requests (via GitHub Action)

✅ Reports inconsistent GitHub releases/tags (via GitHub Action)

✅ Blocks inconsistent commits and tags (via Pre-commit hook)

✅ Modular and extendable for additional software version metadata (via Python CLI)

🔍 How are versions compared?

same-version automatically normalizes all detected versions using Verple, which provides a strict, ultra-conservative version model that fully supports PEP 440, SemVer, Calendar Versioning, and hybrid schemes across ecosystems.

Verple parses versions from many ecosystems (Python, JavaScript, Rust, Java, PHP, R, etc.).
Unlike many versioning libraries that attempt to relax equivalence rules, Verple enforces strict equality: two versions are only considered equal if every component of the version string matches exactly — including release, pre-release, post-release, dev-release, and local identifiers.
This ensures that version mismatches across files are caught even if the differences are subtle (e.g. 1.0.0 vs 1.0.0+build123 are considered different).
For ordering (less-than, greater-than comparisons), Verple allows comparisons only when local identifiers are identical. If local identifiers differ, ordering comparisons are rejected to avoid any ambiguity.

🔬 Why is Verple ultra-conservative?

Many packaging standards (SemVer, PEP 440) have nuanced rules for equality and ordering:

SemVer ignores build metadata when determining equality or ordering.
PEP 440 may allow local identifiers to affect ordering but not equality.

However, for the purpose of cross-file version consistency checking (the core goal of same-version), such leniency can mask subtle inconsistencies that may later cause confusion or deployment issues.

By using Verple's conservative model:

✅ Any discrepancy between files will be surfaced explicitly.
✅ No silent equivalence is assumed across ecosystems.
✅ Comparison logic remains simple, transparent, and safe for reproducibility.

🔬 When is this behavior helpful?

Verple's strict comparison is ideal for version consistency checks, where exact agreement across files is required:

✅ Reproducible research outputs
✅ FAIR/Open Science metadata harmonization
✅ Software citation accuracy
✅ Multi-language package version alignment (Python, JS, R, Rust, etc.)
✅ CI/CD pipelines validating metadata consistency

⚠ When might this behavior be limiting?

Verple’s ultra-conservative model may not be ideal for:

Dependency resolution (where lenient comparisons are often useful)
Compatibility checks (where you care about version ranges, not exact equality)
Package managers that intentionally ignore metadata differences

For those use cases, specialized dependency resolution libraries (e.g. packaging, semver, dephell) may be more appropriate.

🔍 What files does it check?

File	Original Version Format	Normalization
`CITATION.cff`	PEP 440 / free text	Verple
`pyproject.toml`	PEP 440	Verple
`setup.cfg`	PEP 440	Verple
`setup.py`	PEP 440	Verple
`package.json`	SemVer	Verple
`codemeta.json`	Free text	Verple
`.zenodo.json`	Free text	Verple
`composer.json`	PHP Composer (SemVer-like)	Verple
`Cargo.toml`	Rust Cargo (SemVer-like)	Verple
`pom.xml`	Maven (loosely SemVer)	Verple
`.nuspec`	NuGet (SemVer-like)	Verple
`DESCRIPTION`	Free text	Verple
`__version__` file	PEP 440 (usually)	Verple
`ro-crate-metadata.json`	Free text	Verple

✅ All formats are normalized automatically to Verple before comparison.

⚙️ Inputs

CLI Parameter	GitHub Action Input	Description	Required	Default
`--base-version`	`base_version`	Base version from which to compare all other versions	No	(empty)
`--check-github-event`	`check_github_event`	Check GitHut events? (`true` or `false`)	No	`false`
`--github-event-name`	`github_event_name`	GitHub event name (`push` or `release` or `pull_request`)	No	(empty)
`--github-event-ref`	`github_event_ref`	GitHub ref (for `push` event)	No	(empty)
`--github-event-release-tag`	`github_event_release_tag`	GitHub release tag name (for `release` event)	No	(empty)
`--fail-for-missing-file`	`fail_for_missing_file`	Fail for any checked file that is missing	No	`false`
`--check-citation-cff`	`check_citation_cff`	Check `CITATION.cff`? (`true/false`)	No	`true`
`--citation-cff-path`	`citation_cff_path`	Path to `CITATION.cff`	No	`CITATION.cff`
`--check-pyproject-toml`	`check_pyproject_toml`	Check `pyproject.toml`? (`true/false`)	No	`true`
`--pyproject-toml-path`	`pyproject_toml_path`	Path to `pyproject.toml`	No	`pyproject.toml`
`--check-codemeta-json`	`check_codemeta_json`	Check `codemeta.json`? (`true/false`)	No	`true`
`--codemeta-json-path`	`codemeta_json_path`	Path to `codemeta.json`	No	`codemeta.json`
`--check-zenodo-json`	`check_zenodo_json`	Check `.zenodo.json`? (`true/false`)	No	`true`
`--zenodo-json-path`	`zenodo_json_path`	Path to `.zenodo.json`	No	`.zenodo.json`
`--check-package-json`	`check_package_json`	Check `package.json`? (`true/false`)	No	`true`
`--package-json-path`	`package_json_path`	Path to `package.json`	No	`package.json`
`--check-setup-py`	`check_setup_py`	Check `setup.py`? (`true/false`)	No	`true`
`--setup-py-path`	`setup_py_path`	Path to `setup.py`	No	`setup.py`
`--check-setup-cfg`	`check_setup_cfg`	Check `setup.cfg`? (`true/false`)	No	`true`
`--setup-cfg-path`	`setup_cfg_path`	Path to `setup.cfg`	No	`setup.cfg`
`--check-py-version-assignment`	`check_py_version_assignment`	Check Python file with `__version__` assignment? (`true/false`)	No	`false`
`--py-version-assignment-path`	`py_version_assignment_path`	Path to Python file with `__version__` assignment	No	(empty)
`--check-composer-json`	`check_composer_json`	Check `composer.json`? (`true/false`)	No	`true`
`--composer-json-path`	`composer_json_path`	Path to `composer.json`	No	`composer.json`
`--check-ro-crate-metadata-json`	`check_ro_crate_metadata_json`	Check `ro-crate-metadata.json`? (`true/false`)	No	`false`
`--ro-crate-metadata-json-path`	`ro_crate_metadata_json_path`	Path to `ro-crate-metadata.json`	No	`ro-crate-metadata.json`
`--ro-crate-metadata-json-id`	`ro_crate_metadata_json_id`	@id of resource in `ro-crate-metadata.json`	No	(empty)
`--check-cargo-toml`	`check_cargo_toml`	Check `Cargo.toml`? (`true/false`)	No	`true`
`--cargo-toml-path`	`cargo_toml_path`	Path to `Cargo.toml`	No	`Cargo.toml`
`--check-r-description`	`check_r_description`	Check R `DESCRIPTION` file? (`true/false`)	No	`true`
`--r-description-path`	`r_description_path`	Path to R `DESCRIPTION` file	No	`DESCRIPTION`
`--check-pom-xml`	`check_pom_xml`	Check `pom.xml`? (`true/false`)	No	`true`
`--pom-xml-path`	`pom_xml_path`	Path to `pom.xml`	No	`pom.xml`
`--check-nuspec`	`check_nu_spec`	Check `.nuspec`? (`true/false`)	No	`true`
`--nuspec-path`	`nuspec_path`	Path to `.nuspec`	No	`.nuspec`

🎯 When does it run?

GitHub Action:

On pull requests (blocks inconsistent PRs)
On push of version tags (reports incorrect tags after tag creation)
On published GitHub releases (reports incorrect releases after release creation)
Manually (via workflow_dispatch)

Pre-commit hook:

Before each commit (pre-commit hook)
Before pushing commits or tags (pre-push hook)

CLI:

Anytime, on demand

🛠 How to use

1️⃣ Using in GitHub Actions

To block inconsistent pull requests:

name: Check version consistency on pull requests for Python project using pyproject.toml

on:
  pull_request:

jobs:
  check-version:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest

    steps:

      - uses: actions/checkout@v4

      - name: Install Python
        uses: actions/setup-python@v5
        with:
          python-version: ">=3.10"

      - name: Run same-version
        uses: willynilly/same-version@v7.1.0
        with:
          fail_for_missing_file: false
          check_github_event: true
          github_event_name: ${{ github.event_name }}
          github_event_ref: ${{ github.ref }}
          github_event_release_tag: ${{ github.event.release.tag_name }}
          check_pyproject_toml: true
          check_citation_cff: true
          check_codemeta_json: true
          check_zenodo_json: true
          check_setup_cfg: false
          check_setup_py: false
          check_r_description: false
          check_cargo_toml: false
          check_py_version_assignment: false
          check_pom_xml: false
          check_nuspec: false
          check_composer_json: false
          check_ro_crate_metadata_json: false

To report (BUT NOT BLOCK) incorrect tags/releases:

name: Check version consistency on tags/releases for Python project using pyproject.toml

on:
  push:
    tags:
      - 'v*.*.*'
  release:
    types: [published]

jobs:
  check-version:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest

    steps:

      - uses: actions/checkout@v4

      - name: Install Python
        uses: actions/setup-python@v5
        with:
          python-version: ">=3.10"

      - name: Run same-version
        uses: willynilly/same-version@v7.1.0
        with:
          fail_for_missing_file: false
          check_github_event: true
          github_event_name: ${{ github.event_name }}
          github_event_ref: ${{ github.ref }}
          github_event_release_tag: ${{ github.event.release.tag_name }}
          check_pyproject_toml: true
          check_citation_cff: true
          check_codemeta_json: true
          check_zenodo_json: true
          check_setup_cfg: false
          check_setup_py: false
          check_r_description: false
          check_cargo_toml: false
          check_py_version_assignment: false
          check_pom_xml: false
          check_nuspec: false
          check_composer_json: false
          check_ro_crate_metadata_json: false

2️⃣ Using with pre-commit hooks

You can configure a pre-commit hook to block:

✅ Commits with inconsistent version metadata (pre-commit)
✅ Tags with inconsistent version metadata (pre-push)

Adding the hook:

Add to your .pre-commit-config.yaml:

repos:
  - repo: https://github.com/willynilly/same-version
    rev: v7.1.0  # Use latest tag
    hooks:
      - id: same-version
        stages: [pre-commit, pre-push]

Installing the hooks:

# Install the pre-commit tool if you have not already installed it
pip install pre-commit

# Install for both pre-commit and pre-push
pre-commit install -t pre-commit -t pre-push

Manually run the hook (optional):

pre-commit run same-version --all-files

3️⃣ Using the CLI manually

After installing the package:

pip install same-version  # or pip install .

Run the CLI:

same-version

By default, it will scan all files, but not GitHub events. You can specify additiona parameters (see the action.yml of this GitHub Action for a robust example).

By default, the tool will not fail if some of the files are missing. This inclusively checks as many file types as possible without additional configuration. However, you may want to be strict and fail if any files used during checking is missing. Here's an example of failing if any files are missing for a Python project that uses a CITATION.CFF file and pyproject.toml file, any of the other supported files that contain software version metatadata (e.g., codemeta.json, setup.py, package.json, etc.)

same-version --fail-for-missing-file "true" --check-package-json "false" --check-codemeta-json "false" --check-setup-py "false" --check-zenodo-json "false"

You can integrate this into:

✅ Local release scripts
✅ CI pipelines (non-GitHub)
✅ Manual checks

🤝 Contributing

Pull requests and contributions are welcome!

To set up your development environment:

git clone https://github.com/willynilly/same-version.git
cd same-version
pip install -e .[testing,dev]
pre-commit install -t pre-commit -t pre-push
pre-commit run --all-files

🔍 Comparisons with similar tools

Tool / Action	Scope / Limitations
`check-version`	Compares one or two files (e.g. `package.json` or `pyproject.toml`) against Git tag; no cross-file or multi-ecosystem checks
`validate-version-tag-action`	Focused on NPM (`package.json` only); no support for Python, metadata standards, or multi-file consistency
`python-semantic-release`	Automated release tool (version bumping, changelogs); not designed for cross-file or cross-language version consistency
`check-tag-version` (various community actions)	Typically limited to checking one file type; lacks support for multiple ecosystems and scientific metadata standards

✅ same-version is currently the only GitHub Action that provides:

Ultra-conservative version normalization using Verple (strict, cross-standard comparison)
Cross-ecosystem version consistency checks, including:
- Python (pyproject.toml, setup.py, __version__)
- JavaScript (package.json)
- Scientific metadata (CITATION.cff, codemeta.json, .zenodo.json, ro-crate-metadata.json)
- Other languages (composer.json, Cargo.toml, pom.xml, .nuspec, DESCRIPTION)
Strict equality across files using full version fields: release, pre-release, post-release, dev-release, and local identifiers
Lightweight, pure Python implementation — fully offline, no third-party services
Flexible use in GitHub Actions, pre-commit hooks, or standalone CLI

📜 License

Apache License 2.0 — free to use, fork, extend 🚀

🙏 Acknowledgements

Inspired by best practices for reproducible research and software citation!

Name		Name	Last commit message	Last commit date
Latest commit History 60 Commits
.github/workflows		.github/workflows
.vscode		.vscode
src		src
tests		tests
.gitignore		.gitignore
.pre-commit-config.yaml		.pre-commit-config.yaml
.pre-commit-hooks.yaml		.pre-commit-hooks.yaml
CITATION.cff		CITATION.cff
LICENSE		LICENSE
README.md		README.md
action.yml		action.yml
developer.env		developer.env
example.pre-commit-config.yaml		example.pre-commit-config.yaml
pyproject.toml		pyproject.toml

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Repository files navigation

🚀 same-version

📦 What does it do?

1️⃣ GitHub Action

2️⃣ Pre-commit hook

3️⃣ Python CLI

📋 Features

🔍 How are versions compared?

🔬 Why is Verple ultra-conservative?

🔬 When is this behavior helpful?

⚠ When might this behavior be limiting?

🔍 What files does it check?

⚙️ Inputs

🎯 When does it run?

GitHub Action:

Pre-commit hook:

CLI:

🛠 How to use

1️⃣ Using in GitHub Actions

To block inconsistent pull requests:

To report (BUT NOT BLOCK) incorrect tags/releases:

2️⃣ Using with pre-commit hooks

Adding the hook:

Installing the hooks:

Manually run the hook (optional):

3️⃣ Using the CLI manually

🤝 Contributing

🔍 Comparisons with similar tools

📜 License

🙏 Acknowledgements

About

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🚀 same-version

📦 What does it do?

1️⃣ GitHub Action

2️⃣ Pre-commit hook

3️⃣ Python CLI

📋 Features

🔍 How are versions compared?

🔬 Why is Verple ultra-conservative?

🔬 When is this behavior helpful?

⚠ When might this behavior be limiting?

🔍 What files does it check?

⚙️ Inputs

🎯 When does it run?

GitHub Action:

Pre-commit hook:

CLI:

🛠 How to use

1️⃣ Using in GitHub Actions

To block inconsistent pull requests:

To report (BUT NOT BLOCK) incorrect tags/releases:

2️⃣ Using with pre-commit hooks

Adding the hook:

Installing the hooks:

Manually run the hook (optional):

3️⃣ Using the CLI manually

🤝 Contributing

🔍 Comparisons with similar tools

📜 License

🙏 Acknowledgements

About

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