Suggest using the ~ modifier in the version pragma

[axic]

• examples
• style guide

[veox]

From: #2608 (comment)

[chriseth]

Can you explain the benefit of ~ over ^? They behave identical in the examples given in the linked comment.

[axic]

I think I've confused the two, we should be fine.

After major 0 it will be different though:

~1.2.3 := >=1.2.3-0 <1.3.0-0 “Reasonably close to 1.2.3”.
^1.2.3 := >=1.2.3-0 <2.0.0-0 “Compatible with 1.2.3”.

[chriseth]

So can this be closed?

[veox]

@chriseth Guess so.

Must say, I, too, have misunderstood the difference between tilde and caret ranges (for ref in npm's doc: ~ and ^).

For extra safety in the future (after v1.0.0), it might be prudent to recommend (in the docs) ~M.m.p (that is, tilde and all three of major-minor-patch), in the off-chance that a backward-incompatible change makes it into a "minor" update by accident. People who don't think this can happen can use ~M.m instead.

That said, if this recommendation change would be made prior to v1.0.0, it should be safe to start recommending now, since ~0.5.0 and ^0.5.0 result in the same range: >=0.5.0 <0.6.0 (according to npm's docs - haven't looked at solc's code at all on this one).