diff --git a/src/CcsmOptionsHandler.cpp b/src/CcsmOptionsHandler.cpp
index c8f593e..ea413b1 100755
--- a/src/CcsmOptionsHandler.cpp
+++ b/src/CcsmOptionsHandler.cpp
@@ -159,7 +159,7 @@ static llvm::cl::opt<bool>
                          llvm::cl::desc("Enable condition analysis for path counting"),
                          llvm::cl::init(false), llvm::cl::cat(CCSMToolCategory));
 
-static llvm::cl::extrahelp MoreHelp("\nVersion: " GEN_VER_VERSION_STRING);
+static llvm::cl::extrahelp MoreHelp("\nVersion: " GEN_VER_VERSION_STRING "\n");
 
 static void PrintVersion(llvm::raw_ostream &OS) {
     OS << "CCSM (https://github.com/bright-tools/ccsm):" << '\n'
diff --git a/utils/gen_ver/gen_ver.py b/utils/gen_ver/gen_ver.py
index 54aa01c..cbe9d76 100755
--- a/utils/gen_ver/gen_ver.py
+++ b/utils/gen_ver/gen_ver.py
@@ -11,19 +11,16 @@
 def make_ver(git_dir=None):
 
     # Get the version string
-    ver = subprocess.check_output(['git', 'describe', '--match', 'v[0-9]*', '--abbrev=7', 'HEAD'], cwd=git_dir, encoding='UTF-8')
-    # Check for local changes
-    chngs = subprocess.check_output(['git', 'diff-index', '--name-only', 'HEAD', '--'], cwd=git_dir, encoding='UTF-8')
+    ver = subprocess.check_output(['git', 'describe', '--tags', '--match', 'v[0-9]*', '--abbrev=7', '--dirty'],
+                                   cwd=git_dir, universal_newlines=True)
 
     ver_str = ver.rstrip()
-    if len(chngs) > 0:
-        ver_str += ".dirty"
 
     txt = ["/* Generated automatically by {} */".format(os.path.basename(__file__)),
            '#define GEN_VER_VERSION_STRING "{}"'.format(ver_str),
            ]
 
-    return "\n".join(txt)
+    return "\n".join(txt) + "\n"
 
 
 class Usage(Exception):