Deployments

Deploying a new release

Execute the following commands substituting the appropriate values for <version>, <upstream-branch>, and <branch>.:

git checkout <branch>  # the target release branch
git rebase -v origin/<branch>  # make sure it is up to date
git merge --ff-only origin/<upstream-branch> # advance the tip of from upstream-branch
git tag <version>  # create the release candidate
git push --tags origin <branch>  # publish the tag

Version Naming Semenatics

Releases

The version number is composed of three parts: <major>.<minor>.<patch>. The <major> and <minor> parts are incremented for major and minor releases respectively. The <patch> part is incremented for bugfix releases. The <patch> part is reset to 0 when the <minor> part is incremented.

<major> releases signify a breaking change in the API or functionality. <minor> releases signify a new feature that will not impact existing functionality. <patch> releases signify a bugfix that will not impact existing functionality.

Release Candidates

Release candidates are tagged with the rc suffix. For example, the first release candidate for version v1.0.0 is tagged as v1.0.0rc1.

Branch Specific Procedures

The following sections describe the procedures for each branch.

Dev Branch

The dev branch is release procedure is very loose and fluid. It is intended to be a place where new features can be developed and tested before being merged into the qa branch for testing. The dev branch is not intended to be a stable branch. It is a collaboration point for devlopers to collect and orient new code such that it is acceptable for the qa branch for testing.

The dev version of SNAPRed is released on every merge to the dev branch.

QA Branch

The qa branch is the branch that is used for testing new features and bugfixes. It is intended to be a semi-stable branch that allows end users to test/approve new features and bugfixes before they are merged into the main branch and released.

The qa version of SNAPRed is released on manual tag and push by a contributor with appropriate access to the repository.

Main Branch

The main branch is the branch that is used for production deployments. It is intended to be a stable branch representing the latest release of production code.

The main version of SNAPRed is released manually after a release candidate has been tested and approved. The main branch then follows the same release procedure as the qa branch except it is no longer tagged with the rc suffix.