What does .RELEASE mean in Spring Framework versions

Question

What does the .RELEASE ending to a file mean?

e.g.

<dependencies>
  <dependency>
     <groupId>org.springframework</groupId>
     <artifactId>spring-context</artifactId>
     <version>3.0.0.RELEASE</version>
     <scope>runtime</scope>
  </dependency>
</dependencies>

Answer 1

The ".RELEASE" suffix was used in older Spring releases, but was dropped in 2020. It indicates that the version is the release version of the software, rather than a pre-release version.

Pre-2020 naming scheme

Per this (now-defunct) documentation, the pre-2020 naming scheme was {major}.{minor}.{micro}.{release_type}, where release_type was one of the following:

• BUILD-SNAPSHOT: A release currently in development. Such artifacts are typically produced by a nightly CI build, such as SPR-TRUNKSNAPSHOT or INT-NIGHTLY, and deployed to http://maven.springframework.org/snapshot.
• M#: A 'milestone' release. Such artifacts are usually produced manually, following the release process and are deployed to http://maven.springframework.org/milestone.
• RC#: A 'GA release candidate'. Such artifacts are produced with the exact same release process as milestones, and are also deployed to http://maven.springframework.org/milestone.
• RELEASE: A GA (Generally Available) release. Again, produced using the same release process. In this case, deployment happens (a) to http://maven.springframework.org/release and (b) to Maven Central.

Current naming scheme

The current naming scheme used for new Spring releases is MAJOR.MINOR.PATCH[-MODIFIER], with no modifier used for release versions.

• MODIFIER is an optional modifier such that <COUNT> is an incremented 1-based number:
  • For milestones, we will use M<COUNT> .
  • For release candidates, we will use RC<COUNT> .
  • For snapshots, we will use -SNAPSHOT. Note that .BUILD that was present in our previous scheme has been removed.
  • For releases, there will be no modifier.

Naming scheme comparison

Release Type	Current	Previous
Snapshot	5.2.0-SNAPSHOT	5.2.0.BUILD-SNAPSHOT
Milestone	5.2.0-M1	5.2.0.M1
Release Candidate	5.2.0-RC1	5.2.0.RC1
Release	5.2.0	5.2.0.RELEASE