Releasing a new version

Test phase

• First thing to do when planning a release is to propose it. Email the development mailing list and say you think a release should be made.
• If no-one complains branch off a release candidate which must be used for testing and bugfixing only - and finally will be released:

hg clone http://hg.globulation2.org/glob2/
hg clone -r master glob2 glob2_release
cd glob2_release
hg update tip

• Increment version number in SConstruct (find and edit env["VERSION"])
• Run 'scons', 'scons install', and 'scons dist' and make sure all three work (compile, install, and package). If that works, then push the new branch using:

hg push -r release-rc https://hg.globulation2.org/glob2/

• Put a line like: "Changes in <release tag> (release soon)" under "Changes since latest release" in: Changes
• Now announce (on the mailing list) that you branched off the release candidate and that everyone who wants to help testing or fixing it must do the following:

hg clone http://hg.globulation2.org/glob2/
hg clone -r release-rc glob2 glob2_release
cd glob2_release
hg update tip

• Now wait about a week for all bugs to be found and fixed in the release-rc branch.

Note 1: Although pushing fixes to both branches (master and the new release-rc) isn't nessesary, it is probably wise to, so as to avoid conflicts later when merging.

Note 2: Normal glob2 development can take place in the main branch (i.e. master) as usual.

Release phase

Here is a detailed description of the remaining release process applied for all the alpha releases:

Testing

• Pull a new copy of the release branch:

hg clone http://hg.globulation2.org/glob2/
hg clone -r release-rc glob2 glob2_release
cd glob2_release
hg update tip

• Run 'scons -c'
• Run 'scons CXXFLAGS="-O2 -g"'; if any problem occurs, then the release candidate is not ready for release! (the final release could be compiled without the -g and with -O3 but right now -g -O2 is a reasonable tradeoff between speed and debugability)
• Run 'scons install'; if any problem occurs, then the release candidate is *still* not ready for release!
• Test the resulting installed with 'gdb glob2'; if any problem occurs, then the release candidate is nearly ready for release, but too buggy to go out right now, wait another day or two!

Releasing

• If the testing above was successfull, run 'scons dist' to create a tar.gz package.
• Upload it to Savannah in the folder relating to their version (for example, alpha22 = 0.8.22/).
• Send a mail to the development mailing list, update the wiki, update savannah news, and tell rest of the Worlds about the "Good news" ;-)