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The -SNAPSHOT version qualifier is well explained in Oracle's "Understanding Maven Version Numbers".

But now I hear there is a RELEASE and LATEST version "numbers" as well. And at the same news item, that they are deprecated in Maven 3.

What are these RELEASE and LATEST version numbers/notations? Where can I learn more about them?

datv
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    The links you included in your question (to [RELEASE](https://stackoverflow.com/a/1172371/8080472) and [LATEST](https://stackoverflow.com/a/1172371/8080472)) provide an extract from a Maven book which describes the behaviour of the RELEASE and LATEST symbolic version identifiers and they also provide a link to the [Maven release notes](https://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/MAVEN/Maven+3.x+Compatibility+Notes#Maven3.xCompatibilityNotes-PluginMetaversionResolution) describing why they are not supported in Maven v3. Are those links really not sufficient to answer your question? – glytching Aug 08 '17 at 12:14
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    The Oracle's Docs about Maven versions is simply out of date and it is related to Maven 2 but it is not valid for Maven 3+ (nor correct). And yes they are depreacted and should not be used anymore...Better use a real version (release) like `1.5.6.8` or a SNAPSHOT version like `6.3.78.3-SNAPSHOT`. There nothing to learn about `RELEASE` and `LATEST` just don't use them anymore... – khmarbaise Aug 08 '17 at 12:23
  • Thank you @khmarbaise and @glitch. Indeed this has been confusing for me. The link I included in my question is focused on a different question and includes so many links, I need a terser source for explaining in a bit more focused way the purpose and use of these `RELEASE` and `LATEST` keywords. As for the not learning option, I have inherited a project that relies heavily on `RELEASE` at least. Does that mean that the project is stuck at Maven 2? – datv Aug 08 '17 at 12:33
  • It depends. The question is how the `RELEASE` and `LATEST` are used...better is to change them to real versions...but without a full pom file etc I can't more concrete...Maybe this helps a litter bit further: http://blog.soebes.de/blog/2017/02/04/apache-maven-how-version-comparison-works/ – khmarbaise Aug 08 '17 at 13:14

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