Third-party tools that need to determine the MySQL version from the MySQL source can read the VERSION file in the top-level source directory. The file lists the pieces of the version separately. For example, if the version is MySQL 5.7.4-m14, the file looks like this:

MYSQL_VERSION_MAJOR=5
MYSQL_VERSION_MINOR=7
MYSQL_VERSION_PATCH=4
MYSQL_VERSION_EXTRA=-m14

If the source is not for a MySQL Server General Availablility (GA) release, the MYSQL_VERSION_EXTRA value is nonempty. In the preceding example, the value corresponds to Milestone 14.

MYSQL_VERSION_EXTRA is also nonempty for NDB Cluster releases (including GA releases of NDB Cluster), as shown here:

MYSQL_VERSION_MAJOR=5
MYSQL_VERSION_MINOR=7
MYSQL_VERSION_PATCH=32
MYSQL_VERSION_EXTRA=-ndb-7.5.21

To construct a five-digit number from the version components, use this formula:

MYSQL_VERSION_MAJOR*10000 + MYSQL_VERSION_MINOR*100 + MYSQL_VERSION_PATCH