HOWTORELEASE.rst

Release Procedure

Our current policy for releasing is to aim for a bugfix every few weeks and a minor release every 2-3 months. The idea is to get fixes and new features out instead of trying to cram a ton of features into a release and by consequence taking a lot of time to make a new one.

Important

pytest releases must be prepared on Linux because the docs and examples expect to be executed in that platform.

1. Create a branch release-X.Y.Z with the version for the release.

   • patch releases: from the latest master;
   • minor releases: from the latest features; then merge with the latest master;

   Ensure your are in a clean work tree.

2. Using tox, generate docs, changelog, announcements:

   $ tox -e release -- <VERSION>
   

   This will generate a commit with all the changes ready for pushing.

3. Open a PR for this branch targeting master.

4. After all tests pass and the PR has been approved, publish to PyPI by pushing the tag:

   git tag <VERSION>
   git push [email protected]:pytest-dev/pytest.git <VERSION>
   

   Wait for the deploy to complete, then make sure it is available on PyPI.

5. Merge the PR into master.

6. Send an email announcement with the contents from:

   doc/en/announce/release-<VERSION>.rst
   

   To the following mailing lists:

   • [email protected] (all releases)
   • [email protected] (all releases)
   • [email protected] (only major/minor releases)

   And announce it on Twitter with the #pytest hashtag.

7. After a minor/major release, merge release-X.Y.Z into master and push (or open a PR).