diff --git a/docs/user.markdown b/docs/user.markdown
index 19ee9a1f..9ed85c31 100644
--- a/docs/user.markdown
+++ b/docs/user.markdown
@@ -248,3 +248,11 @@ or in case you need to be root (_e.g._ on Ubuntu and most Linux distributions
 for convenience):
 
     sudo pip install --upgrade alibuild
+
+In general updating aliBuild is safe and it should never trigger a rebuild or
+break compilation of older versions of alidist (i.e. we do try to guarantee
+backward compatibility). In no case an update of aliBuild will result in the
+update of `alidist`, which users will have to be done separately.
+In case some yet to appear bug in alibuild will force us to rebuild a
+previously built area, this will be widely publicized and users will get a warning
+when running the command.