HOWTORELEASE.rst

Release Procedure

Our current policy for releasing is to aim for a bug-fix release 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 on that platform.

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

   • maintenance releases: from 4.6-maintenance;
   • 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 (or 4.6-maintenance for maintenance releases).

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

   git tag <VERSION>
   git push git@github.com:pytest-dev/pytest.git <VERSION>
   

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

5. Merge the PR.

6. If this is a maintenance release, cherry-pick the CHANGELOG / announce files to the master branch:

   git fetch --all --prune
   git checkout origin/master -b cherry-pick-maintenance-release
   git cherry-pick --no-commit -m1 origin/4.6-maintenance
   git checkout origin/master -- changelog
   git commit  # no arguments
   

7. Send an email announcement with the contents from:

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

   To the following mailing lists:

   • pytest-dev@python.org (all releases)
   • python-announce-list@python.org (all releases)
   • testing-in-python@lists.idyll.org (only major/minor releases)

   And announce it on Twitter with the #pytest hashtag.