3GPP 21.900 v20.0.0 — the document's own text
4.0A Version nomenclature
Taught in 7. Reading a 3GPP number — the series, the version, the file name (How standards actually get made, in depth), 3. From an idea to an approved version (How standards actually get made, overview), 7. Reading either body's paper trail yourself (How standards actually get made, overview), 3. One idea, from proposal to published text (How standards actually get made, quick start), 4. Looking it up yourself, and what the record will not tell you (How standards actually get made, quick start).
Each specification is associated with a "version number" in the form x.y.z which uniquely identifies the document. The significance of the three fields is defined in table 3.
Table 3: Version number fields
| Field | Use | Remarks |
|---|---|---|
| x | majoralso referred to as "release" | 0: draft1: presented to TSG for information (specification estimated by prime responsible Group to be at least 60% stable)2: presented to TSG for approval (specification estimated by prime responsible Group to be at least 80% stable)3 or greater: approved by TSG and under change control; the value indicates the Release according to table 4. |
| y | technical | Incremented every time a technical change is introduced into the specification. Once under change control, such changes shall only occur when the TSG approves one or more Change Requests. Reset to zero every time the "major" field is incremented. |
| z | editorial | Incremented every time a purely editorial change is introduced into the specification. Reset to zero every time the "technical" field is incremented or reset to zero. |
Table 3 shows the estimated degree of stability to be used as a guideline for determining when to raise a specification to version 1.y.z and to 2.y.z. Such figures are obviously subjective, and the decision is ultimately at the discretion of the responsible Group.
A TS or TR having reached at least 60% stability and presented to the TSG for the first time shall be presented with its major version number set to 1, i.e. as version 1.y.z..