Versions and Ranges

Glide supports Semantic Versions, SemVer ranges, branches, tags, and commit ids as versions.

Basic Ranges

A simple range is in the form > 1.2.3. This tells Glide to use the latest versions that's after 1.2.3. Glide has support for the following operators:

  • =: equal (aliased to no operator)
  • !=: not equal
  • >: greater than
  • <: less than
  • >=: greater than or equal to
  • <=: less than or equal to

These can be combined. A , is an and operator and a || is an or operator. The or operators cause groups of and operators to be checked. For example, ">= 1.2, < 3.0.0 || >= 4.2.3".

Hyphen Ranges

There are multiple shortcuts to handle ranges and the first is hyphens ranges. These look like:

  • 1.2 - 1.4.5 which is equivalent to >= 1.2, <= 1.4.5
  • 2.3.4 - 4.5 which is equivalent to >= 2.3.4, <= 4.5

Wildcards In Comparisons

The x, X, and * characters can be used as a wildcard character. This works for all comparison operators. When used on the = operator it falls back to the patch level comparison (see tilde below). For example,

  • 1.2.x is equivalent to >= 1.2.0, < 1.3.0
  • >= 1.2.x is equivalent to >= 1.2.0
  • <= 2.x is equivalent to < 3
  • * is equivalent to >= 0.0.0

Tilde Range Comparisons (Patch)

The tilde (~) comparison operator is for patch level ranges when a minor version is specified and major level changes when the minor number is missing. For example,

  • ~1.2.3 is equivalent to >= 1.2.3, < 1.3.0
  • ~1 is equivalent to >= 1, < 2
  • ~2.3 is equivalent to >= 2.3, < 2.4
  • ~1.2.x is equivalent to >= 1.2.0, < 1.3.0
  • ~1.x is equivalent to >= 1, < 2

Caret Range Comparisons (Major)

The caret (^) comparison operator is for major level changes. This is useful when comparisons of API versions as a major change is API breaking. For example,

  • ^1.2.3 is equivalent to >= 1.2.3, < 2.0.0
  • ^1.2.x is equivalent to >= 1.2.0, < 2.0.0
  • ^2.3 is equivalent to >= 2.3, < 3
  • ^2.x is equivalent to >= 2.0.0, < 3