introducing code version that you can require via "use Bio::EnsEMBL::Hive::Version 2.0"

modules/Bio/EnsEMBL/Hive/Version.pm

+=pod 
+
+=head1 NAME
+
+    Bio::EnsEMBL::Hive::Version
+
+=head1 SYNOPSIS
+
+    use Bio::EnsEMBL::Hive::Version 2.0;
+
+=head1 DESCRIPTION
+
+    Version number of the Hive code.
+
+=head1 LICENSE
+
+    Copyright [1999-2014] Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute and the EMBL-European Bioinformatics Institute
+
+    Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License"); you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
+    You may obtain a copy of the License at
+
+         http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
+
+    Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software distributed under the License
+    is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS, WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
+    See the License for the specific language governing permissions and limitations under the License.
+
+=head1 CONTACT
+
+  Please subscribe to the Hive mailing list:  http://listserver.ebi.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/ehive-users  to discuss Hive-related questions or to be notified of our updates
+
+=cut
+
+
+package Bio::EnsEMBL::Hive::Version;
+
+use strict;
+use warnings;
+
+our $VERSION = '1.9';
+
+sub get_code_version {
+
+    return $VERSION;
+}
+
+1;

t/require_code_version.pl

+#!/usr/bin/env perl
+
+use strict;
+use warnings;
+
+use Bio::EnsEMBL::Hive::Version 2.0;
+
+print "Hello, world! We are using Hive version ".Bio::EnsEMBL::Hive::Version->get_code_version."\n";
+