The issue is that many projects (gnuplot, builtbot, and others) have a VERSION file in their top level src directory. On a traditional Linux system the case sensitivity would make sure the right file is included. However, many/most OS X file systems are case insensitive. As such, the project's VERSION file gets included instead. And does not compile.
I have no solution to the issue other than I renamed our project’s VERSION file for the time being. However, I wanted to raise the issue as I noticed it when moving to 1.75 and backtracked out that it was a recent changed starting with boost 1.73
We have a recurring issue filed on this here: https://github.com/boostorg/config/issues/345 So while I agree it's annoying, and I feel your pain, the fact is that <version> is a std lib header, and a very useful one (for us at least), so while you might have hit this issue here first, it's likely to become more and more common over time. Best, John. -- This email has been checked for viruses by Avast antivirus software. https://www.avast.com/antivirus