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Clarify versioning policy #701

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2 changes: 2 additions & 0 deletions .gitignore
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public
.DS_Store
README.html

/.quarto/
44 changes: 16 additions & 28 deletions content/blog/2019/r-version-support/index.md
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---

## Which versions of R do tidyverse packages support?
Our general policy is to support the **current version**, the **devel version**, and **four previous versions** of R. This policy applies to all packages that we support, i.e. as well as all tidyverse packages, it also applies to the infrastructure packages that we maintain in [r-lib](https://github.com/r-lib).

Though package-specific minimum versions of R are given in the `Depends` fields of individual `DESCRIPTION` files, our general policy is to support the **current version**, the **devel version**, and **four previous versions** of R.
This, the *official* minimum supported versions of R for the tidyverse are as described here:
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**Edit 2022-11-15[^1]**
| Date | Released R version | Minimum supported version |
|-----------:|:-------------------|:--------------------------|
| 2019-04-26 | 3.6 | 3.2 |
| 2020-04-24 | 4.0 | 3.3 |
| 2021-05-18 | 4.1 | 3.4 |
| 2022-04-22 | 4.2 | 3.5 |
| 2023-04-21 | 4.3 | 3.6 |
| 2024-04-24 | 4.4 | 4.0 |
| 2025 | 4.5 | 4.1 |
| 2026 | 4.6 | 4.2 |

Over the past several years and moving forward (as described in the "Release plans" section of the [R Developer Page](https://developer.r-project.org/)), R version releases occur annually:
Note that, as described in the "Release plans" section of the [R Developer Page](https://developer.r-project.org/), R version releases occur annually in Spring. We generally update the required version in package metadata on the next package release after the R package, so you may see older versions listed in published CRAN packages.
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> The overall release schedule is to have annual x.y.0 releases in Spring, with patch releases happening on an as-needed basis.

Thus, the *official* minimum supported versions of R for the tidyverse[^2] are as described in the table, below.

<div class="highlight">

| Year | Current R version | Minimum supported version |
|-----:|:------------------|:--------------------------|
| 2019 | 3.6 | 3.2 |
| 2020 | 4.0 | 3.3 |
| 2021 | 4.1 | 3.4 |
| 2022 | 4.2 | 3.5 |
| 2023 | 4.3 | 3.6 |
| 2024 | 4.4 | 4.0 |
| 2025 | 4.5 | 4.1 |
| 2026 | 4.6 | 4.2 |

Tidyverse minimum R version support

</div>

[^1]: Add table with annual historic and projected R-version support.

[^2]: Note that older versions *may* be supported. For example, as of 2022, the [tidyverse package `Depends` field](https://github.com/tidyverse/tidyverse/blob/aeabcde8c6ae435f16b5173682d5667d292829fb/DESCRIPTION#LL17-L18) is R (\>= 3.3).
### Edit history

* 2022-11-15: Added table with annual historic and projected R-version support.
* 2024-07-03: Clarified that the policy also applies to r-lib and added release dates.