Since version 3.0.0, QEMU uses a time based version numbering scheme:
- major
- incremented by 1 for the first release of the year
- minor
- reset to 0 with every major increment, otherwise incremented by 1 for each release from git master
- micro
- always 0 for releases from git master, incremented by 1 for each stable branch release
The implication of this is that changes in major version number
do not have any bearing on the scope of changes
included in the release. Non-backward compatible changes may be made
in any master branch release, provided they have followed the
deprecation policy
which calls for warnings to be emitted for a minimum of two releases
prior to the change.