Should version be encoded in the IPN?

[cbrake]

GitPLM is currently works with the version of things we are making encoded in the VVVV. It seems conventional wisdom in the PLM world encourages version to be encoded separately.

https://www.perplexity.ai/search/how-do-plm-systems-do-versioni-vHqqjnvlQ0abyqaJe0Qjmg

However, I have the following questions:

1. how do you clearly communicate what version of something is in the field? With the GitPLM IPN format, you can simple relay the IPN, and everyone knows the version.
2. There is a case to be made that if a range of versions of a component can work in an assembly, then how do you communicate this? The case is made that keeping the version separate makes this easier.
3. The concern is raised that encoding the version in the IPN makes a lot of work anytime the version of something changes -- the BOMs all the way up to the top level need to change. Perhaps this leads to a lot of churn in manufacturing as they have to deploy all these updates. Perhaps we are thinking about this too conventionally -- where everything used to be manually processed. With automation, updating the BOMs on the engineering side could be made easy. I'm not sure about the manufacturing side, but it seems again that automation should be able to help.

Thinking through this, Perhaps a BOM could specify a range of versions that are acceptable, or even multiple IPNs:

• PCA-0023-0003 (A single version is acceptable)
• PCA-0023-0003/5 (v3 - v5 is acceptable)
• PCA-0023-0003,5 (v3 and v5 is acceptable, v4 cannot be used)
• PCA-0023-0004/5,PCA-0056-0001 (two different assemblies can be used)

One that is becoming clear is that AI coding will drastically lower the costs to implement custom tooling that was not possible before.

[cbrake]

It seems it is common practice to increment the version of every BOM up to the top level:

https://www.perplexity.ai/search/how-do-plm-systems-deal-with-b-k0RmwW05SI6RKPHLeHpFwQ

So I'm still a bit puzzled why encoding the version in the IPN is so bad.

How to deal with a range of acceptable versions is less clear.