diff --git a/configure.ac b/configure.ac
index a9f0316..b320438 100644
--- a/configure.ac
+++ b/configure.ac
@@ -2,7 +2,7 @@ dnl Process this file with autoconf to produce a configure script.
 dnl This config.in requires autoconf 2.5 or greater.
 
 AC_PREREQ([2.68])
-AC_INIT([qpdf],[7.1.1])
+AC_INIT([qpdf],[8.0.a1])
 
 AC_CONFIG_MACRO_DIR([m4])
 AC_CONFIG_FILES([autoconf.mk])
@@ -29,25 +29,13 @@ LT_INIT([win32-dll])
 # * Otherwise, increment LT_REVISION
 
 # LT = libtool
-LT_CURRENT=20
-LT_AGE=2
-LT_REVISION=1
+LT_CURRENT=21
+LT_AGE=0
+LT_REVISION=0
 AC_SUBST(LT_CURRENT)
 AC_SUBST(LT_REVISION)
 AC_SUBST(LT_AGE)
 LT_SONAME=$(expr $LT_CURRENT - $LT_AGE)
-# BEGIN LT_SONAME WORKAROUND
-# For elf versioned symbols, get the soname version. Unfortunately,
-# there was a mistake at one point where we had 19 when we should have
-# had 18, so make this a special case until the next ABI change. At
-# that point, just remove the code deliminated by the LT_SONAME
-# WORKAROUND comments.
-if test $LT_SONAME = 18; then
-  LT_SONAME=19
-elif test $LT_SONAME -gt 18; then
-  AC_MSG_ERROR(Remove LT_SONAME workaround in configure.ac)
-fi
-# END LT_SONAME WORKAROUND
 AC_SUBST(LT_SONAME)
 
 AC_ARG_ENABLE(insecure-random,
diff --git a/libqpdf/QPDF.cc b/libqpdf/QPDF.cc
index 31f1311..c6fddd3 100644
--- a/libqpdf/QPDF.cc
+++ b/libqpdf/QPDF.cc
@@ -19,7 +19,7 @@
 #include <qpdf/QPDF_Null.hh>
 #include <qpdf/QPDF_Dictionary.hh>
 
-std::string QPDF::qpdf_version = "7.1.1";
+std::string QPDF::qpdf_version = "8.0.a1";
 
 static char const* EMPTY_PDF =
     "%PDF-1.3\n"
diff --git a/manual/qpdf-manual.xml b/manual/qpdf-manual.xml
index 9e61a5b..99528c3 100644
--- a/manual/qpdf-manual.xml
+++ b/manual/qpdf-manual.xml
@@ -5,8 +5,8 @@
 <!ENTITY mdash "&#x2014;">
 <!ENTITY ndash "&#x2013;">
 <!ENTITY nbsp "&#xA0;">
-<!ENTITY swversion "7.1.1">
-<!ENTITY lastreleased "February 4, 2018">
+<!ENTITY swversion "8.0.a1">
+<!ENTITY lastreleased "February 20, 2018">
 ]>
 <book>
  <bookinfo>