WIP
Introduction
The purpose of this document is to describe the cadence, processes, milestones, and associated tasks used in the CAMARA meta-release cycle. See CAMARA meta-releases for information and schedule for specific releases.
Release Milestones
Release milestones and their associated tasks, are used to track the status of the meta-release. The milestones and management tasks used in the release process are described in the table below.
| Milestone | Milestone Name | Actions to achieve milestone | Timeline | Week number |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kickoff - M0 | Start of release cycle. | M0 | 0 | |
M1 | Initiate Commonalities & ICM |
| M0 + 2 week | 2 |
M2 | Finalize Commonalities & ICM |
| M1 + 10 weeks | 12 |
M3 | Initiate Sub-projects / APIs |
| M1 + 8 weeks | 10 |
M4 | Finalize Sub-projects / APIs |
| M3 + 10 weeks | 20 |
M5 | Meta Release |
| M4 + 2 weeks | 22 |
M6 | Post- Release |
| M5 + 2 weeks | 24 |
Release cadence
CAMARA meta-releases are scheduled twice per year at approximately 6 month intervals (March and September).
Release contacts
Meta-releases are administered and tracked by
- the CAMARA Release Managers, supported by
- the release contacts of the Commonalities and ICM working groups
- the release contacts of the API Sub-projects
The teams can put their release contact names on the Release Contacts (Maintainers) page.
Team release contacts need to subscribe to the release management mailing list.
Process
Details on API versioning and the link with the release management is described here: Releasing API versions. Meta-release names will be named SpringYY or FallYY where YY is the (short) year number.
Meta-release (M0, M5, M6)
A meta-release has 6 milestones, M0 through M6 described above. For the milestone dates per meta-release, please see the Meta-release planning.
The Release Management team has the following activities for each meta-release:
- Create the meta-release page under CAMARA meta-releases
- Inform all team's release contacts through the release management mailing list that they need to create the API release tracker as described here: How to: API release tracking.
- Declare the kick-off of the meta release.
- Starting at M4, prepare and publish the meta-release at M5.
- Conduct a meta-release retrospective as input to the next meta release
At M0 preparation,
- the Commonalities and ICM teams shall update the meta-release page with the information of what they plan to contribute to the meta-release, and with the status updates during the meta-release cycle.
- all API Sub-project teams shall create their release tracker page(s) for the API version(s) they plan to contribute to the meta-release
An ongoing meta-release status is discussed in the Release Management working group meetings.
Meta-release progress is visible on the meta-release page. The data is obtained as follows:
- the Commonalities and ICM data is updated directly on the meta-release page by the respective teams.
- the API data is managed by the API Sub-project teams on their API release tracker page.
Release milestone status
The milestone status values are defined as follows:
| Milestone | Before M data | After M date |
|---|---|---|
| M0 | scope definition | kick-off done |
| M1 | wip / alpha | alpha available for M2 |
| M2 | wip / release-candidate | release-candidate available for M3 |
| M3 | API wip / alpha | API alpha available for M4 |
| M4 | API wip / release-candidate | API release-candidate available for M5 |
| M5 | meta-release preparation | meta-release published |
| M6 | retrospective ongoing | meta-release concluded |
Commonalities & ICM (M0, M1, M2)
The Commonalities and ICM teams shall respectively update the related meta-release page table as follows:
- Whenever a new pre-release is made available, the (Pre-)Release tag column shall be updated with the latest pre-release tag link for the API version.
- The actual milestone dates shall be put in the table when the milestone is achieved.
- The link to the release package, when available, shall be added at each pre-release change, and at M2.
- Once TSC approval is given at M2, the target public-release version shall be created for M5 and the meta-release page updated with the final public-release.
APIs (M0, M3, M4)
API Sub-project teams shall update their API release tracker for the API as follows:
- With the each pre-release API version the API pre-release version and tag fields shall be updated.
- The actual milestone dates shall be put in the table when the milestone is passed.
- The link to the release package, if available, shall be added at each pre-release change, and minimally at M3 and M4.
- When M5 is passed, the link to the public-release API package shall be added.
For API Sub-projects that contain multiple APIs,
- All APIs of the release shall have the same API version.
- If not, a separate API Sub-project shall be created for the API with a different version and it shell be release separately.
API version tag
the main branch always contains the latest API version. It is meant for development.
API pre-releases can be created through initial, alpha or release-candidate API version tags and API version release packages. These pre-releases become more stable with increasing API versions.
- after a pre-release is created, intermediate PRs shall set the API version to just "wip" to indicate its instability until a next pre-release is created.
API version release package
Release packages shall be creates using the GitHub release process.
Each release package shall include the release notes using the provided template.
Each release package has a tag: pre-release or latest.
Meta-release roadmap
Release roadmaps can be found here: Meta-release planning