CalVer is not something most people expect, it doesn't match the GitHub releases and it doesn't actually work as it returns 1:20200101.8 for 1.0.8 released on 2021-11-11 (which is the date 0 in lpc55 calver from my quick check).
See this discussion for an example of confusion: solokeys/kickstarter2021#31
It's not clear at all that this version is actually 1.0.8 from GitHub.
lpc55-host also implements to_semver, so it should be a simple replacement.