[Distutils] Setting version from commandline or setup.cfg?

Hello, I'm trying to automate my release process from vcs - something like: run tests -> fetch current major, minor from branch (e.g. release_1.2) and revision from tag (e.g. v1.2.1) -> upload with current major, minor and revision +1 > tag with such current major, minor and incremented revision. I'd like to set my version from outside my setup.py file, either via setup.py or a commandline option - I don't want to execute code in my setup.py since this usually causes all sort of headaches with missing dependencies. Is there any proper way to do it? Might I break other things unexpectedly? -- Alan Franzoni -- contact me at public@[mysurname].eu