docs: tell how to create branches for releases (bazel-contrib#2613)

rickeylev · web-flow · commit e509b7cac741 · 2025-02-15T00:15:57.000Z
It's easier to do patch releases when the branch is already created.
Some of the bugs
fixes in recent releases we probably could have easily released as patch
releases if
we already had the branch ready.
diff --git a/DEVELOPING.md b/DEVELOPING.md
@@ -27,12 +27,20 @@ also test-drive the commit in an existing Bazel workspace to sanity check functi
 ### Releasing from HEAD
 
 #### Steps
-1. [Determine the next semantic version number](#determining-semantic-version)
-1. Create a tag and push, e.g. `git tag 0.5.0 upstream/main && git push upstream --tags`
-   NOTE: Pushing the tag will trigger release automation.
-1. Watch the release automation run on https://github.com/bazelbuild/rules_python/actions
-1. Add missing information to the release notes. The automatic release note
-   generation only includes commits associated with issues.
+1. [Determine the next semantic version number](#determining-semantic-version).
+1. Update CHANGELOG.md: replace the `v0-0-0` and `0.0.0` with `X.Y.0`.
+1. Replace `VERSION_NEXT_*` strings with `X.Y.0`.
+1. Send these changes for review and get them merged.
+1. Create a branch for the new release, named `release/X.Y`
+   ```
+   git branch --no-track release/X.Y upstream/main && git push upstream release/X.Y
+   ```
+1. Create a tag and push:
+   ```
+   git tag X.Y.0 upstream/release/X.Y && git push upstream --tags
+   ```
+   **NOTE:** Pushing the tag will trigger release automation.
+1. Release automation will create a GitHub release and BCR pull request.
 
 #### Determining Semantic Version
 
@@ -54,8 +62,7 @@ release tag and the patch changes cherry-picked into it.
 In this example, release `0.37.0` is being patched to create release `0.37.1`.
 The fix being included is commit `deadbeef`.
 
-1. `git checkout -b release/0.37 0.37.0`
-1. `git push upstream release/0.37`
+1. `git checkout release/0.37`
 1. `git cherry-pick -x deadbeef`
 1. Fix merge conflicts, if any.
 1. `git cherry-pick --continue` (if applicable)
