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Release checklist

Forest doesn't follow a fixed schedule but releases should be expected at least quarterly. A release officer is volunteered for each release, and they are responsible for either following the checklist or, in case of absence, passing the task to a different team member.

Prepare the release​

Make a pull request with the following changes:

  • Update the CHANGELOG.md file to reflect all changes and preferably write a small summary about the most notable updates. The changelog should follow the design philosophy outlined here. Go through the output of git log <last-tag>..HEAD and remember that the audience of the CHANGELOG does not have intimate knowledge of the Forest code-base. All the changed/updated/removed features should be reasonably understandable to an end-user.
  • Update the version of the forest crate (and any others, if applicable) to be released. Make sure that the updated files do not contain a [patch.crates-io] section, otherwise you won't be able to make a release on crates.io.
  • Make sure to run cargo publish --dry-run and include the Cargo.lock crate version change in the release.
  • The Pull Request must have the Release label.

Release on GitHub​

  • Create a new release. Click on Choose a tag button and create a new one. The tag must start with a lowercase v, e.g., v0.11.0. Follow the title convention of the previous releases, and write a small summary of the release (similar or identical to the summary in the CHANGELOG.md file). Add additional, detailed notes with Generate release notes button.
  • Verify that the new release contains assets for both Linux and macOS (the assets are automatically generated and should show up after 30 minutes to an hour).
  • 🔁 If it's a new stable release (and not a backport), tag the version as latest with the retag action.
  • Verify that the new release is available in the GitHub Container Registry. Use docker pull ghcr.io/chainsafe/forest:<version>. Verify the tags in the packages list.
  • Verify that the new release is published to crates.io.