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Hello :prefect: team— qq on versioning flows:

We currently use `version_group_id` when we register flows to differentiate the environment (i.e. prod, staging, etc). Not only do they run in separate environments, those flows all have separate version history as well. I see in the docs that `version_group_id` is deprecated. So what’s the best practice for differentiating flow groups for separate environments? Should we use the env as part of the flow name, e.g. `my_flow_prod`? And if that’s the case, does Project + Name uniquely identify the flow? Thanks!

Hi Jeff, we're planning on deprecating `version_group_id` in favor of a similar mechanism, but that deprecation hasn't completed yet. See <https://prefect-community.slack.com/archives/CL09KU1K7/p1608758775445500?thread_ts=1608756725.445100&amp;cid=CL09KU1K7> for more info.

As for your 2nd question, yes a project + flow name uniquely identifies a flow, so grouping by project may also work for your use case. Note that if you're using `Local` storage you'll need to explicitly specify a path (since the default path doesn't take the project into a ccount), but other than that things will work fine.

(that linked thread above has some other ideas for how to version flows between environments you may be interested in)

<@U011EKN35PT> wait, so if I have two flows with the same name in the different projects with `Local` storage, and don't specify the path, they will use the same path and hence the flow registered later will "override" the flow registered earlier?

Currently yes (I view this as a bug though, see <https://github.com/PrefectHQ/prefect/issues/3900>). Cloud/server will register separate flows, but the actual flow storage in your local filesystem will overwrite the other flow since the file names collide.

Ohhhh! Now I understand why I am getting weird errors with some flows claiming that I may have changed the flow code without re-registering the flow.

Ah, yeah, that'd do it. Since this has bit two users now, I'll prioritize the fix for the next release.

Thanks, that's a huge help because I really couldn't figure out why my flows would work individually but fail when I did the combined setup.