Release Checklist

Pre-release

Code

• Ensure GitHub milestone is emptied, moving over to backlog accordingly
  • Merge pending pull requests and changes in
• Revert volatile features/changes
• Make sure all new functions are added to CResourceChecker.Data.h
• QA new translations pull request, make adjustments and merge if good to go
• Regenerate localized main menu images and commit to repo (todo(patrik): script to be added to repo)
• Run win-apply-clang-format.bat on the whole codebase and add that commit to .git-blame-ignore-revs
• Update credits (new contributors, any changes, vendors)
• Update vendor packages from upstreams
• Grant contributor roles on forums and Discord accordingly if not up to date

News post, changelog and documentation

• Lock a good date and time for release beforehand. Ideally once a year around the same time. Ping all relevant team members and staff.
• Draft up news article, share on forum
• Go through log (git log 1.5.9...master, where 1.5.9 is the most recently released) and, on the changelog:
  • Note down nice new features
  • Note down nice bug fixes
  • Note down any community contributor (commit authors)
• Go through list of features and do a once over for functionality tests
• Ensure all new functions or changes have been documented on wiki.multitheftauto.com
• Add highlights to the news post
• Update your forum draft, asking for final feedback
• Await approval of news post

Don't forget to include:

• Resource contributors
• If you encounter an already documented new feature, note down the page authors

MTA Client News

This section is incomplete.

• Create MTA client news (see C:\ProgramData\MTA San Andreas All\1.5\news)
• Test to make sure it looks OK
• Use reloadnews command to help with development.
• Upload it to MTA server in rar format

Release

Code

• Make sure your local copy of master branch is up to date
• Bump version in code (e.g. https://github.com/multitheftauto/mtasa-blue/commit/0017cec99b0c90ac1ee37d47f14798b010c5928a and https://github.com/multitheftauto/mtasa-blue/commit/58b6598e9e0b7dca7156d03f9d60ff6ef2080c50) and main menu (if vX or vX.Y)

Once distribution has begun

• Tag mainline using git tag 1.6.0 master and push using git push origin 1.6.0

Operations

• Ping all relevant team members and staff.
• Wait for build server, or trigger it yourself.
• Bump on nightly update server.
• Once the update has begun distribution, push tags to the repo
• Create release on GitHub, with binary upload as well as a link to the news post. A summary is good as well.
• Bump wiki version
• Update linux.multitheftauto.com static version text, and the new files must be handled through https://github.com/multitheftauto/linux.multitheftauto.com
• If releasing a new major or minor (vX, vX.Y), make sure to check that our backends and tools support it, e.g: https://github.com/multitheftauto/mtadiag/blob/master/src/Diag.cpp#L445-L504
• Only single digit version numbers (vX.Y.Z) are supported

Social Media

Somewhere around distribution time

Publish forum news post! (It's okay if you are off by a little.)

After distribution has begun

• Announce on Discord (use @everyone and also publish to other guilds)
• Post on Facebook
• Post on Twitter
• Post on ModDB
• Post on Steam
• Post on Reddit
• Post on LinkedIn
• Livestream on Twitch if you're up for it

Post-release

• Go to your kitchen and get a nice glass of water, because keeping hydrated is important.
• Pat yourself and the rest of the team on the back.
• Keep an eye out for complaints to make sure you haven't made a mistake and pushed something catastrophic.
• Don't feel bad about bugs you introduced as all software has flaws. It happens.
• Work towards the next release!

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Authors: qaisjp, patrikjuvonen