Automatic date update in version.in

[thirdparty/binutils-gdb.git] / bfd / version.h

diff --git a/bfd/version.h b/bfd/version.h
index 960afa07c0972eefc38e82b18022043e301537ee..a94c7e6f79f9a6cf8d91e5e79e374d33bb52f02d 100644 (file)
--- a/bfd/version.h
+++ b/bfd/version.h
@@ -1,4 +1,22 @@
-#define BFD_VERSION_DATE 20170912
+/* The date below is automatically updated every day by a bot.  During
+   development, we include the date in the tools' version strings
+   (visible in 'ld -v' etc.) because people build binutils from a
+   variety of sources - git, tarballs, distro sources - and we want
+   something that can easily identify the source they used when they
+   report bugs.  The bfd version plus date is usually good enough for
+   that purpose.
+
+   During development, this date ends up in libbfd and libopcodes
+   sonames because people naturally expect shared libraries with the
+   same soname to have compatible ABIs.  We could bump the bfd version
+   on every ABI change, but that's just another thing contributors and
+   maintainers would need to remember.  Instead, it's much easier for
+   all if the soname contains the date.  This is not perfect but is
+   good enough.
+
+   In releases, the date is not included in either version strings or
+   sonames.  */
+#define BFD_VERSION_DATE 20171117
 #define BFD_VERSION @bfd_version@
 #define BFD_VERSION_STRING  @bfd_version_package@ @bfd_version_string@
 #define REPORT_BUGS_TO @report_bugs_to@