Zulip server release checklist

This document has reminders of things one might forget to do when preparing a new release.

A week before the release

  • Major releases only (e.g. 4.0):

    • Upgrade all Python dependencies in requirements to latest upstream versions so they can burn in (use pip list --outdated).

    • Upgrade all puppet dependencies in puppet/deps.yaml

    • Upgrade all puppet-installed dependencies (e.g. Smokescreen, go, etc) in puppet/zulip/manifests/common.pp

    • Upload strings to Transifex using push-translations. Post a Transifex announcement notifying translators that we’re approaching a release.

    • Merge draft updates to the changelog with changes since the last release. While doing so, take notes on things that might need follow-up work or documentation before we can happily advertise them in a release blog post.

    • Inspect all TODO/compatibility comments for whether we can remove any backwards-compatibility code in this release.

  • Create a burn-down list of issues that need to be fixed before we can release, and make sure all of them are being worked on.

  • Draft the release blog post (a.k.a. the release notes) in Paper. In it, list the important changes in the release, from most to least notable.

Final release preparation

  • Update the Paper blog post draft with any new commits.

  • Download updated translation strings from Transifex and commit them. Use the --branch 6.x parameter for maintenance releases.

  • Use build-release-tarball to generate a pre-release tarball.

  • Test the new tarball extensively, both new install and upgrade from last release, on Ubuntu 20.04 or 22.04.

  • Repeat until release is ready.

  • Send around the Paper blog post draft for review.

  • Move the blog post draft to Astro:

    • Use “··· > Export > Markdown” to get a pretty good Markdown conversion, and save it in src/posts with a filename appropriate for a URL slug.

    • Add the needed YAML frontmatter.

    • Move any images into public and update their references.

    • Proofread, especially for formatting.

    • If the draft post should remain secret until release, avoid using a guessable Git branch name for the pull request (the deployment preview URL is based on the branch name).

  • Major releases only (e.g. 4.0): Schedule team members to provide extra responsive #production help support following the release.

Executing the release

  • Create the release commit, on main (for major releases) or on the release branch (for minor releases):

    • Copy the Markdown release notes for the release into docs/overview/changelog.md.

    • Verify the changelog passes lint, and has the right release date.

    • Major releases only: Adjust the changelog.md heading to have the stable release series boilerplate.

    • Update ZULIP_VERSION and LATEST_RELEASE_VERSION in version.py.

    • Major releases only: Update API_FEATURE_LEVEL to a feature level for the final release, and document a reserved range.

  • Run tools/release with the release version.

  • Update the Docker image:

    • Commit the Docker updates:

      • Update ZULIP_GIT_REF in Dockerfile

      • Update README.md

      • Update the image in docker-compose.yml, as well as the ZULIP_GIT_REF

    • Commit the Helm updates:

      • Add a new entry to kubernetes/chart/zulip/CHANGELOG.md

      • Update the appVersion in kubernetes/chart/zulip/Chart.yaml

      • Update the tag in kubernetes/chart/zulip/values.yaml

      • Update the docs by running helm-docs

      • Update the image in kubernetes/manual/zulip-rc.yml

    • Build the image: docker build . -t zulip/docker-zulip:4.11-0 --no-cache

    • Also tag it with latest: docker build . -t zulip/docker-zulip:latest

    • Push those tags: docker push zulip/docker-zulip:4.11-0; docker push zulip/docker-zulip:latest

    • Push the commits to main.

  • Merge the blog post PR.

  • Announce the release, pointing to the blog post, via:

Post-release

  • The DigitalOcean one-click image will report in an internal channel once it is built, and how to test it. Verify it, then publish it to DigitalOcean marketplace.

  • Major releases only:

    • Create a release branch (e.g. 4.x).

    • On the release branch, update ZULIP_VERSION in version.py to the present release with a +git suffix, e.g. 4.0+git.

    • On main, update ZULIP_VERSION to the future major release with a -dev+git suffix, e.g. 5.0-dev+git. Make a Git tag for this update commit with a -dev suffix, e.g. 5.0-dev. Push the tag to both zulip.git and zulip-internal.git to get a correct version number for future Cloud deployments.

    • Consider removing a few old releases from ReadTheDocs; we keep about two years of back-versions.

    • Update Transifex to add the new 4.x style release branch resources and archive the previous release branch’s resources with the “Translations can’t translate this resource” setting.

    • Add a new CI production upgrade target:

      • Build a docker image: cd tools/ci && docker build . -f Dockerfile.prod --build-arg=BASE_IMAGE=zulip/ci:bullseye --build-arg=VERSION=5.0 --tag=zulip/ci:bullseye-5.0 && docker push zulip/ci:bullseye-5.0

      • Add a new line to the production_upgrade matrix in .github/workflows/production-suite.yml.

  • Minor releases only (e.g. 3.2):

    • On the release branch, update ZULIP_VERSION to the present release with a +git suffix, e.g. 3.2+git.

    • On main, update LATEST_RELEASE_VERSION with the released version, as well as the changelog changes from the release branch.

  • Prereleases only (e.g. 7.0-beta3):

    • Atop the prerelease commit (e.g. 7.0-beta3), make a commit updating ZULIP_VERSION to the prerelease version with a +git suffix, e.g. 7.0-beta3+git. Push this to main. (If main has already diverged from the prerelease, a merge commit will be needed here.)

    • Delete the prerelease branch (e.g. 7.0-beta3-branch); it’s now an ancestor of main and thus unnecessary.