Releases - iToto/developmentCycle GitHub Wiki

Releases are a pretty huge deal.

A release happens when our master branch is in a stable state and is ready to be distributed to our customers.

When we are ready to release we create a tag in our git history. There are a number of ways to create tags, the git manual explains them quite well.

We use a numerical tagging system that looks like X.Y.Z. Each number has a different purpose.

The first number tracks major releases. These come across the least often and include new features and bug fixes.

The second number tracks minor releases. These will include bug fixes since the last release.

The third number is for hotfixes. Hotfixes occur when a critical bug is found after a release and the fix is needed immediately.

Once a tag is created, there’s no going back. We should not move tags just because we forgot to include something. Anything passed that tag should be put into another tag, and another release.

Just because we tag a release doesn’t mean anyone will actually use that release in production. It’s possible that a critical bug is found a few hours after we tag and we generate a hotfix and increment the Z number in our version.