7. Version numbers and binary compatibility
Open MPI has two sets of version numbers that are likely of interest to end users / system administrators:
Software version number
Shared library version numbers
Both are predicated on Open MPI’s definition of “backwards compatibility.”
7.1. Backwards Compatibility
Open MPI version Y is backwards compatible with Open MPI version X (where Y>X) if users can:
Compile an MPI/OpenSHMEM application with version X,
mpirun
/oshrun
it with version Y, and get the same user-observable behavior.Invoke
ompi_info
with the same CLI options in versions X and Y and get the same user-observable behavior.
Note that this definition encompasses several things:
Application Binary Interface (ABI)
MPI / OpenSHMEM run time system
mpirun
/oshrun
command line optionsMCA parameter names / values / meanings
However, this definition only applies when the same version of Open MPI is used with all instances of the runtime and MPI / OpenSHMEM processes in a single MPI job. If the versions are not exactly the same everywhere, Open MPI is not guaranteed to work properly in any scenario.
Backwards compatibility tends to work best when user applications are dynamically linked to one version of the Open MPI / OSHMEM libraries, and can be updated at run time to link to a new version of the Open MPI / OSHMEM libraries.
For example, if an MPI / OSHMEM application links statically against
the libraries from Open MPI vX, then attempting to launch that
application with mpirun
/ oshrun
from Open MPI vY is not guaranteed to
work (because it is mixing vX and vY of Open MPI in a single job).
Similarly, if using a container technology that internally bundles all
the libraries from Open MPI vX, attempting to launch that container
with mpirun
/ oshrun
from Open MPI vY is not guaranteed to work.
7.2. Software Version Number
Official Open MPI releases use the common “A.B.C” version identifier format. Each of the three numbers has a specific meaning:
Major: The major number is the first integer in the version string Changes in the major number typically indicate a significant change in the code base and/or end-user functionality, and also indicate a break from backwards compatibility. Specifically: Open MPI releases with different major version numbers are not backwards compatibale with each other.
Important
This rule does not extend to versions prior to v1.10.0. Specifically: v1.10.x is not guaranteed to be backwards compatible with other v1.x releases.
Minor: The minor number is the second integer in the version string. Changes in the minor number indicate a user-observable change in the code base and/or end-user functionality. Backwards compatibility will still be preserved with prior releases that have the same major version number (e.g., v2.5.3 is backwards compatible with v2.3.1).
Release: The release number is the third integer in the version string. Changes in the release number typically indicate a bug fix in the code base and/or end-user functionality. For example, if there is a release that only contains bug fixes and no other user-observable changes or new features, only the third integer will be increased (e.g., from v4.3.0 to v4.3.1).
The “A.B.C” version number may optionally be followed by a quantifier string:
aX
: Indicates an alpha release. X is an integer indicating the number of the alpha release (e.g., v1.10.3a5 indicates the 5th alpha release of version 1.10.3).bX
: Indicates a beta release. X is an integer indicating the number of the beta release (e.g., v1.10.3b3 indicates the 3rd beta release of version 1.10.3).rcX
: Indicates a release candidate. X is an integer indicating the number of the release candidate (e.g., v1.10.3rc4 indicates the 4th release candidate of version 1.10.3).
Nightly development snapshot tarballs use a different version number scheme; they contain three distinct values:
The git branch name from which the tarball was created.
The date/timestamp, in
YYYYMMDDHHMM
format.The hash of the git commit from which the tarball was created.
For example, a snapshot tarball filename of
openmpi-v2.x-201703070235-e4798fb.tar.bz2
indicates that this tarball
was created from the v2.x branch, on March 7, 2017, at 2:35am GMT,
from git hash e4798fb.