这也是一个纯bash解决方案，因为printf是bash内置的。

function ver()
# Description: use for comparisons of version strings.
# $1  : a version string of form 1.2.3.4
# use: (( $(ver 1.2.3.4) >= $(ver 1.2.3.3) )) && echo "yes" || echo "no"
{
    printf "%02d%02d%02d%02d" ${1//./ }
}

这在版本中最多为4个字段。

$ function ver { printf "%03d%03d%03d%03d" $(echo "$1" | tr '.' ' '); }
$ [ $(ver 10.9) -lt $(ver 10.10) ] && echo hello  
hello

我的观点是:

vercomp () {
    if [[ "${1}" == "${2}" ]]; then
        echo '0'
        return
    fi
    echo "${1}" | sed 's/\([0-9]\+\)\./\1\n/g' | {
        _RES_=-1
        for _VB_ in $(echo "${2}" | sed 's/\([0-9]\+\)\./\1\n/g'); do
            if ! read -r _VA_ || [[ "${_VB_}" -gt "${_VA_}" ]]; then
                _RES_=1
                break
            fi
        done
        read -r _VA_ && echo '-1' || echo "${_RES_}"
    }
}

语法:

vercomp VERSION_A VERSION_B

打印:

-1如果VERSION_A是最近的版本 如果两个版本相等，则为0 如果VERSION_B是最近的版本，则为1

下面是对顶部答案(Dennis的)的改进，它更简洁，并使用了不同的返回值方案，以便通过单个比较轻松实现<=和>=。它还比较不是[0-9]的第一个字符之后的所有内容。]因此1.0rc1 < 1.0rc2。

# Compares two tuple-based, dot-delimited version numbers a and b (possibly
# with arbitrary string suffixes). Returns:
# 1 if a<b
# 2 if equal
# 3 if a>b
# Everything after the first character not in [0-9.] is compared
# lexicographically using ASCII ordering if the tuple-based versions are equal.
compare_versions() {
    if [[ $1 == "$2" ]]; then
        return 2
    fi
    local IFS=.
    local i a=(${1%%[^0-9.]*}) b=(${2%%[^0-9.]*})
    local arem=${1#${1%%[^0-9.]*}} brem=${2#${2%%[^0-9.]*}}
    for ((i=0; i<${#a[@]} || i<${#b[@]}; i++)); do
        if ((10#${a[i]:-0} < 10#${b[i]:-0})); then
            return 1
        elif ((10#${a[i]:-0} > 10#${b[i]:-0})); then
            return 3
        fi
    done
    if [ "$arem" '<' "$brem" ]; then
        return 1
    elif [ "$arem" '>' "$brem" ]; then
        return 3
    fi
    return 2
}

为了解决@gammazero的评论，一个(我认为)与语义版本兼容的更长的版本是:

# Compares two dot-delimited decimal-element version numbers a and b that may
# also have arbitrary string suffixes. Compatible with semantic versioning, but
# not as strict: comparisons of non-semver strings may have unexpected
# behavior.
#
# Returns:
# 1 if a<b
# 2 if equal
# 3 if a>b
compare_versions() {
    local LC_ALL=C

    # Optimization
    if [[ $1 == "$2" ]]; then
        return 2
    fi

    # Compare numeric release versions. Supports an arbitrary number of numeric
    # elements (i.e., not just X.Y.Z) in which unspecified indices are regarded
    # as 0.
    local aver=${1%%[^0-9.]*} bver=${2%%[^0-9.]*}
    local arem=${1#$aver} brem=${2#$bver}
    local IFS=.
    local i a=($aver) b=($bver)
    for ((i=0; i<${#a[@]} || i<${#b[@]}; i++)); do
        if ((10#${a[i]:-0} < 10#${b[i]:-0})); then
            return 1
        elif ((10#${a[i]:-0} > 10#${b[i]:-0})); then
            return 3
        fi
    done

    # Remove build metadata before remaining comparison
    arem=${arem%%+*}
    brem=${brem%%+*}

    # Prelease (w/remainder) always older than release (no remainder)
    if [ -n "$arem" -a -z "$brem" ]; then
        return 1
    elif [ -z "$arem" -a -n "$brem" ]; then
        return 3
    fi

    # Otherwise, split by periods and compare individual elements either
    # numerically or lexicographically
    local a=(${arem#-}) b=(${brem#-})
    for ((i=0; i<${#a[@]} && i<${#b[@]}; i++)); do
        local anns=${a[i]#${a[i]%%[^0-9]*}} bnns=${b[i]#${b[i]%%[^0-9]*}}
        if [ -z "$anns$bnns" ]; then
            # Both numeric
            if ((10#${a[i]:-0} < 10#${b[i]:-0})); then
                return 1
            elif ((10#${a[i]:-0} > 10#${b[i]:-0})); then
                return 3
            fi
        elif [ -z "$anns" ]; then
            # Numeric comes before non-numeric
            return 1
        elif [ -z "$bnns" ]; then
            # Numeric comes before non-numeric
            return 3
        else
            # Compare lexicographically
            if [[ ${a[i]} < ${b[i]} ]]; then
                return 1
            elif [[ ${a[i]} > ${b[i]} ]]; then
                return 3
            fi
        fi
    done

    # Fewer elements is earlier
    if (( ${#a[@]} < ${#b[@]} )); then
        return 1
    elif (( ${#a[@]} > ${#b[@]} )); then
        return 3
    fi

    # Must be equal!
    return 2
}

$ for OVFTOOL_VERSION in "4.2.0" "4.2.1" "5.2.0" "3.2.0" "4.1.9" "4.0.1" "4.3.0" "4.5.0" "4.2.1" "30.1.0" "4" "5" "4.1" "4.3"
> do
>   if [ $(echo "$OVFTOOL_VERSION 4.2.0" | tr " " "\n" | sort --version-sort | head -n 1) = 4.2.0 ]; then 
>     echo "$OVFTOOL_VERSION is >= 4.2.0"; 
>   else 
>     echo "$OVFTOOL_VERSION is < 4.2.0"; 
>   fi
> done
4.2.0 is >= 4.2.0
4.2.1 is >= 4.2.0
5.2.0 is >= 4.2.0
3.2.0 is < 4.2.0
4.1.9 is < 4.2.0
4.0.1 is < 4.2.0
4.3.0 is >= 4.2.0
4.5.0 is >= 4.2.0
4.2.1 is >= 4.2.0
30.1.0 is >= 4.2.0
4 is < 4.2.0
5 is >= 4.2.0
4.1 is < 4.2.0
4.3 is >= 4.2.0

我实现了另一个比较器函数。这一个有两个特定的要求:(i)我不希望函数失败使用返回1，但echo代替;(ii)当我们从git存储库中检索版本时，版本“1.0”应该大于“1.0.2”，这意味着“1.0”来自trunk。

function version_compare {
  IFS="." read -a v_a <<< "$1"
  IFS="." read -a v_b <<< "$2"

  while [[ -n "$v_a" || -n "$v_b" ]]; do
    [[ -z "$v_a" || "$v_a" -gt "$v_b" ]] && echo 1 && return
    [[ -z "$v_b" || "$v_b" -gt "$v_a" ]] && echo -1 && return

    v_a=("${v_a[@]:1}")
    v_b=("${v_b[@]:1}")
  done

  echo 0
}

请随意评论并提出改进建议。