+    if(NOT "${VERSION}" MATCHES
+       "^[0-9]+\\.[0-9]+\\.[0-9]+-[0-9a-zA-Z]+\\.?r?[0-9]*\\.?g?[0-9a-zA-Z]*$")
+
+        message(FATAL_ERROR 
+                "\nCOULD NOT EXTRACT VALID VERSION STRING FROM git_describe!"
+                "\n git_describe returned: \"${GIT_DESCRIPTION}\""
+                "\n Extracted invalid version string: \"${VERSION}\"\n")
+
+    endif(NOT "${VERSION}" MATCHES
+          "^[0-9]+\\.[0-9]+\\.[0-9]+-[0-9a-zA-Z]+\\.?r?[0-9]*\\.?g?[0-9a-zA-Z]*$")
+
+    set(${_gitversionprefix}       "${VERSION}"       PARENT_SCOPE)