Rename Lifecycle to Versioning and Compatibility#2850
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The protocol is stateless: there is no initialize/operate/shutdown sequence left to describe. Initialization became per-request metadata, and shutdown is a transport-binding concern documented on the binding pages. The remaining content of the lifecycle page has one theme: how two implementations agree on what they are speaking. - Rename basic/lifecycle.mdx to basic/versioning.mdx, titled "Versioning and Compatibility", covering version negotiation, extension negotiation, and backward compatibility. Add a redirect. - Move the statelessness section to the base-protocol overview, where the execution model belongs. - Update navigation and all draft-internal links.
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CaitieM20
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Jun 3, 2026
| client can correlate the notification with the originating subscription request. | ||
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| [lifecycle]: /specification/draft/basic/lifecycle | ||
| [lifecycle]: /specification/draft/basic/versioning |
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should this lifecycle also get renamed to versioning?
CaitieM20
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Jun 3, 2026
CaitieM20
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one minor comment looks like an aliased link is still named lifecycle, would be good to fix.
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Note
Stacked on #2845 (which is stacked on #2844). Review the diff against
refactor/transport-docs.Motivation and Context
The draft made MCP stateless, and the Lifecycle page no longer describes a lifecycle. There is no initialize/operate/shutdown sequence: initialization became per-request
_meta, and shutdown is a transport-binding concern documented on the binding pages (the only real lifecycle left is the channel's, and it lives there). Comparable stateless protocols name this material versioning/conformance, not lifecycle; lifecycle sections belong to connection-oriented protocols (TLS, QUIC, WebSocket).What remains on the page has a single theme: how two implementations agree on what they are speaking.
Changes
basic/lifecycle.mdxtobasic/versioning.mdx, titled "Versioning and Compatibility": protocol version negotiation, extension negotiation, era terminology, and backward compatibility with the matrix. Redirect added; section anchors unchanged.basic/index.mdx), where the execution model belongs, next to Messages and Message Patterns.How was this tested?
npm run preppasses andmint broken-linksis clean.