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Updates to RELEASE.md #2195

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Jun 24, 2022
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Updates to RELEASE.md #2195

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718a401
Add more releases, split long lines for easier editing.
pstibrany Jun 22, 2022
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Added section on creating release on GitHub with contributor stats an…
pstibrany Jun 22, 2022
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Added part about cherry-picking with -x and squash & merge.
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103 changes: 77 additions & 26 deletions RELEASE.md
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Original file line number Diff line number Diff line change
Expand Up @@ -10,17 +10,29 @@ A new Grafana Mimir release is cut approximately every 6 weeks. The following ta
| ------- | ---------- | ----------------- |
| 2.0.0 | 2022-03-20 | Marco Pracucci |
| 2.1.0 | 2022-05-16 | Johanna Ratliff |
| 2.2.0 | 2022-06-27 | _To be announced_ |
| 2.2.0 | 2022-06-27 | Oleg Zaytsev |
| 2.3.0 | 2022-08-08 | _To be announced_ |
| 2.4.0 | 2022-09-19 | _To be announced_ |
| 2.5.0 | 2022-10-31 | _To be announced_ |

## Release shepherd responsibilities

The release shepherd is responsible for an entire minor release series, meaning all pre- and patch releases of a minor release. The process formally starts with the initial pre-release, but some preparations should be made a few days in advance.

- We aim to keep the main branch in a working state at all times. In principle, it should be possible to cut a release from main at any time. In practice, things might not work out as nicely. A few days before the pre-release is scheduled, the shepherd should check the state of main. Following their best judgement, the shepherd should try to expedite bug fixes that are still in progress but should make it into the release. On the other hand, the shepherd may hold back merging last-minute invasive and risky changes that are better suited for the next minor release.
- There may be some actions left to address when cutting this release. The release shepherd is responsible for going through TODOs in the repository and verifying that nothing is that is due this release is forgotten.
- On the planned release date, the release shepherd cuts the first pre-release (using the suffix `-rc.0`) and creates a new branch called `release-<major>.<minor>` starting at the commit tagged for the pre-release. In general, a pre-release is considered a release candidate (that's what `rc` stands for) and should therefore not contain any known bugs that are planned to be fixed in the final release.
- With the pre-release, the release shepherd is responsible for coordinating or running the release candidate in any end user production environment for at least 1 week. This is typically done at Grafana Labs.
The release shepherd is responsible for an entire minor release series, meaning all pre- and patch releases of a minor release.
The process formally starts with the initial pre-release, but some preparations should be made a few days in advance.

- We aim to keep the `main` branch in a working state at all times. In principle, it should be possible to cut a release
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[not a blocker, but agreeing on some consistent will help long term maintaneability] I'm not sure this line break splitting follows docs squad recommendation. To my understanding there should be 1 full sentence per line, to help code reviews (so that with GitHub suggestions you can easily rewrite 1 sentence at a time). @jdbaldry am I right or wrong?

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@pstibrany pstibrany Jun 24, 2022 •
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I typically stick to 1 sentence / line format (unless sentences are very short, or too long – then I break them), but got carried away in this list. Will fix it.

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I am definitely in favor of one line per sentence for easier line based diffing. I'm not yet certain that this is a strong enough argument to move from personal preference to enforced style though.

from `main` at any time. In practice, things might not work out as nicely. A few days before the pre-release is scheduled,
the shepherd should check the state of `main` branch. Following their best judgement, the shepherd should try to expedite
bug fixes that are still in progress but should make it into the release. On the other hand, the shepherd may hold back
merging last-minute invasive and risky changes that are better suited for the next minor release.
- There may be some actions left to address when cutting this release. The release shepherd is responsible for going through
TODOs in the repository and verifying that nothing is that is due this release is forgotten.
- On the planned release date, the release shepherd cuts the first pre-release (using the suffix `-rc.0`) and creates
a new branch called `release-<major>.<minor>` starting at the commit tagged for the pre-release. In general, a pre-release
is considered a release candidate (that's what `rc` stands for) and should therefore not contain any known bugs that
are planned to be fixed in the final release.
- With the pre-release, the release shepherd is responsible for coordinating or running the release candidate in any end
user production environment for at least 1 week. This is typically done at Grafana Labs.
- If regressions or critical bugs are detected, they need to get fixed before cutting a new pre-release (called `-rc.1`, `-rc.2`, etc.).

See the next section for details on cutting an individual release.
Expand All @@ -33,13 +45,16 @@ We use [Semantic Versioning](https://semver.org/).

We maintain a separate branch for each minor release, named `release-<major>.<minor>`, e.g. `release-1.1`, `release-2.0`.

The usual flow is to merge new features and changes into the main branch and to merge bug fixes into the latest release branch. Bug fixes are then merged into main from the latest release branch. The main branch should always contain all commits from the latest release branch. As long as main hasn't deviated significantly from the release branch, new commits can also go to main, followed by cherry picking them back into the release branch.
The usual flow is to merge new features and changes into the `main` branch and to merge bug fixes into the latest release branch.
Bug fixes are then merged into `main` from the latest release branch.
The `main` branch should always contain all commits from the latest release branch.
As long as `main` hasn't deviated significantly from the release branch, new commits can also go to `main`, followed by cherry-picking them back into the release branch. See [Cherry-picking changes into release branch](#cherry-picking-changes-into-release-branch).

Maintaining the release branches for older minor releases happens on a best effort basis.

### Show that a release is in progress

This helps ongoing PRs to get their changes in the right place, and to consider whether they need cherry-picking.
This helps ongoing PRs to get their changes in the right place, and to consider whether they need cherry-picking into release branch.

1. Make a PR to update `CHANGELOG.md` on main
- Add a new section for the new release so that `## main / unreleased` is blank and at the top.
Expand All @@ -49,13 +64,16 @@ This helps ongoing PRs to get their changes in the right place, and to consider

### Prepare your release

For a new major or minor release, create the corresponding release branch based on the main branch. For a patch release, work in the branch of the minor release you want to patch.
For a new major or minor release, create the corresponding release branch based on the main branch.
For a patch release, work in the branch of the minor release you want to patch.

To prepare a release branch, first create new release branch (release-X.Y) in the Mimir repository from the main commit of your choice, and then do the following steps on a temporary branch (prepare-release-X.Y) and make a PR to merge said branch into the new release branch (prepare-release-X.Y -> release-X.Y):
To prepare a release branch, first create new release branch (release-X.Y) in the Mimir repository from the main commit of your choice,
and then do the following steps on a temporary branch (prepare-release-X.Y) and make a PR to merge said branch into
the new release branch (prepare-release-X.Y -> release-X.Y):

1. Make sure you've a GPG key associated with your GitHub account (`git tag` will be signed with that GPG key)
- You can add a GPG key to your GitHub account following [this procedure](https://help.github.com/articles/generating-a-gpg-key/)
1. Update the version number in the `VERSION` file to say "X.Y-rc.0"
1. Update the version number in the `VERSION` file to say `X.Y-rc.0`
1. Update `CHANGELOG.md`
- Ensure changelog entries for the new release are in this order:
- `[CHANGE]`
Expand All @@ -64,26 +82,40 @@ To prepare a release branch, first create new release branch (release-X.Y) in th
- `[BUGFIX]`
- Run `./tools/release/check-changelog.sh LAST-RELEASE-TAG...main` and add any missing PR which includes user-facing changes

Once your release preparation PR is approved, merge it to the "release-X.Y" branch, and continue with publishing.
Once your release preparation PR is approved, merge it to the `release-X.Y` branch, and continue with publishing.

### Publish a release candidate

To publish a release candidate:

1. Do not change the release branch directly; make a PR to the release-X.Y branch with VERSION and any CHANGELOG changes.
1. Ensure the `VERSION` file has the `-rc.X` suffix (`X` starting from `0`)
1. Ensure the `VERSION` file has the `-rc.X` suffix (`X` starting from `0`).
1. After merging your PR to the release branch, `git tag` the new release (see [How to tag a release](#how-to-tag-a-release)) from the release branch.
1. Wait until the CI pipeline succeeds (once a tag is created, the release process through GitHub Actions will be triggered for this tag)
1. Create a pre-release on GitHub
- Write the release notes (including a copy-paste of the changelog)
- Build binaries with `make BUILD_IN_CONTAINER=true dist` and attach them to the release (building in container ensures standardized toolchain)
1. Wait until the CI pipeline succeeds (once a tag is created, the release process through GitHub Actions will be triggered for this tag).
1. Create a pre-release on GitHub. See [Creating release on GitHub](#creating-release-on-github).

### Creating release on GitHub

1. When creating release on GitHub, select your new tag, use `Mimir <VERSION>` as Release Title, and click "Generate release notes" button.
This will pre-fill the changelog for the release. You can delete all of it, except "New Contributors" section.
1. Release notes should contain:
- "This release contains XX contributions from YY authors. Thank you!" at the beginning.
- You can find the numbers by doing compare like `https://github.com/grafana/mimir/compare/mimir-2.0.0...mimir-2.1.0` from previous Mimir release. (Note the syntax: `.../compare/<old ref>...<new ref>`, yes there are three dots).
- Number of commits = "contributions", number of contributors = "authors".
- As an example, for [current HEAD on commit 017a738](https://github.com/grafana/mimir/compare/mimir-2.1.0...017a738e94) shows 185 contributions and 36 authors since Mimir 2.1.0.
- Most interesting new features for users. Use your judgement.
- Full copy-paste of the CHANGELOG since previous release.
- "New Contributors" section at the end (created by "Generate release notes" button in GitHub UI).
1. Build binaries with `make BUILD_IN_CONTAINER=true dist` and attach them to the release (building in container ensures standardized toolchain).

### Publish a stable release

> **Note:** Technical documentation is automatically published on release tags or release branches with a corresponding release tag. The workflow that publishes documentation is defined in [`publish-technical-documentation-release.yml`](.github/workflows/publish-technical-documentation-release.yml).
> To publish a stable release:
> **Note:** Technical documentation is automatically published on release tags or release branches with a corresponding
> release tag. The workflow that publishes documentation is defined in [`publish-technical-documentation-release.yml`](.github/workflows/publish-technical-documentation-release.yml).

1. Do not change the release branch directly; make a PR to the release-X.Y branch with VERSION and any CHANGELOG changes.
To publish a stable release:

1. Do not change the release branch directly; make a PR to the `release-X.Y` branch with VERSION and any CHANGELOG changes.
1. Ensure the `VERSION` file has **no** `-rc.X` suffix
1. Update the Mimir version in the following locations:
- `operations/mimir/images.libsonnet` (`_images.mimir` and `_images.query_tee` fields)
Expand All @@ -94,14 +126,12 @@ To publish a release candidate:
1. Open a PR
1. After merging your PR to the release branch, `git tag` the new release (see [How to tag a release](#how-to-tag-a-release)) from the release branch.
1. Wait until the CI pipeline succeeds (once a tag is created, the release process through GitHub Actions will be triggered for this tag)
1. Create a release on GitHub
- Write the release notes (including a copy-paste of the changelog)
- Build binaries with `make BUILD_IN_CONTAINER=true dist` and attach them to the release (building in container ensures standardized toolchain)
1. Create a release on GitHub. This is basically a copy of release notes from pre-release version, with up-to-date CHANGELOG (if there were any changes in release candidates).
1. Merge the release branch `release-x.y` into `main`
- Create `merge-release-X.Y-to-main` branch **from the `release-X.Y` branch** locally
- Merge the upstream `main` branch into your `merge-release-X.Y-to-main` branch and resolve conflicts
- Make a PR for merging your `merge-release-X.Y-to-main` branch into `main`
- Once approved, merge the PR with a "Merge" commit through one of the following strategies:
- Once approved, merge the PR with a **Merge** commit through one of the following strategies:
- Temporarily enable "Allow merge commits" option in "Settings > Options"
- Locally merge the `merge-release-X.Y-to-main` branch into `main`, and push the changes to `main` back to GitHub. This doesn't break `main` branch protection, since the PR has been approved already, and it also doesn't require removing the protection.
1. Open a PR to add the new version to the backward compatibility integration test (`integration/backward_compatibility_test.go`)
Expand All @@ -115,7 +145,11 @@ To publish a release candidate:

### How to tag a release

Every release is tagged with `mimir-<major>.<minor>.<patch>`, e.g. `mimir-2.0.0`. Note the `mimir-` prefix, which we use to specifically avoid the Go compiler recognizing them as version tags. We don't want compatibility with Go's module versioning scheme, since it would require us to keep each major version's code in its own directory beneath the repository root, f.ex. v2/. We also don't provide any API backwards compatibility guarantees within a single major version.
Every release is tagged with `mimir-<major>.<minor>.<patch>`, e.g. `mimir-2.0.0`.
Note the `mimir-` prefix, which we use to specifically avoid the Go compiler recognizing them as version tags.
We don't want compatibility with Go's module versioning scheme, since it would require us to keep each major version's
code in its own directory beneath the repository root, f.ex. v2/.
We also don't provide any API backwards compatibility guarantees within a single major version.

You can do the tagging on the commandline:

Expand All @@ -124,3 +158,20 @@ $ version=$(< VERSION)
$ git tag -s "mimir-${version}" -m "v${version}"
$ git push origin "mimir-${version}"
```

### Cherry-picking changes into release branch

To cherry-pick a change (commit) from `main` into release branch, please do the following:

```bash
$ git checkout release-X.Y # Start with the release branch
$ git checkout -b cherry-pick-pr-ZZZ # Create new branch for cherry-picking
$ git cherry-pick -x <commit ID> # Cherry pick the change using -x option to add original commit ID to the message
$ git push origin cherry-pick-pr-ZZZ # Push branch to Github.
```

After pushing branch to PR, you can create the PR by opening `https://github.com/grafana/mimir/pull/new/cherry-pick-pr-ZZZ` link.
Make sure to set `release-X.Y` as the base branch, into which PR should be merged.
After PR with cherry-picked commit is reviewed, do a standard "Squash & Merge" commit that we use in Mimir.
Keep the commit message suggested by Github, which is a combination of original commit message, original PR number, new PR number and cherry-picked commit hash.
Github will properly attribute you and also original commit author as contributors to this change, and will also link to original commit in the UI.