Eclipse PDE - Plug-in, Feature, and Product Versioning

I am having much 开发者_JAVA技巧confusion over the process of upgrading version numbers in dependent plug-ins, features, and products in a fairly large eclipse workspace.

I have made API changes to java code residing in an existing plug-in and thus requires an increase of the Major part of the version identifier. This plug-in serves as a dependency to a given feature, where the feature is later included in a product. From the documentation at http://wiki.eclipse.org/Version_Numbering, I understand (for the most part) when the proper number should be increased on the containing plug-in itself.

However, how would this Major version number change on the plug-in affect dependent, "down-the-line" items (e.g., features, products)?

For example, assume we have the typical "Hello World" setup as follows:

Plug-in: com.example.helloworld, version 1.0.0

Feature: com.example.helloworld.feature, version 1.0.0

Product: com.example.helloworld.product, version 1.0.0

If I were to make an API change in the plug-in, this would require a version update to be that of 2.0.0. What would then be the version of the feature, 1.1.0? The same question can be applied for the product level as well (e.g., if the feature is 1.1.0 OR 2.0.0, what is the product version number)?

I'm sure this is quite the newbie question so I apologize for wasting anyone's time and effort. I have searched for this type of content but all I am finding is are examples showing how to develop a plug-in, feature, product, and update site for the first time. The only other content related to my search has been developing feature patches and have not touched on the versioning aspect as much as I would prefer. I am having difficulty coming into (for the first time) an Eclipse RCP / PDE environment and need to learn the proper way and / or best practices for making such versioning updates and how to best reflect this throughout other dependent projects in the workspace.

If you would like to apply the same versioning systems to feature and product, then you would set feature and product to 2.0.0 when one of the plugins go to 2.0.0. That would communicate to whoever is consuming your feature or product that there is a breaking API change inside it somewhere.

On the other hand, there is no requirement to apply the same versioning convention. You can version your bundles following that convention to properly communicate your API changes and then turn around and use more marketing-sensible versions for product/feature. Keep in mind that user will see product/feature version more than they will individual bundle version.

I've seen it done both ways effectively. There isn't really a right or wrong way on this.