Release Checklist

Pre-release

Code

• Ensure GitHub milestone is emptied, moving over to backlog accordingly
• Revert volatile features/changes
• Make sure all new functions are added to CResourceChecker.Data.h
• Update Pootle templates by uploading the translation file to Pootle after building it with build_gettext_catalog.exe (preferably while working on the release and not on release day...)
• Merge in new translations pull request
• Regenerate main menu images (script to be added to repo)
• Run clang format on the whole codebase and add that commit to /.git-blame-ignore-revs

News post, changelog and documentation

• Draft up news article, share on forum
• Go through log (git log 1.5.5...master, where 1.5.5 is the most recently released) and, on the changelog:
  • Note down nice new features
  • Note down nice bugfixes
  • Note down any community contributor (commit authors)
• Go through list of features and do a once over for functionality tests
• Ensure all new functions or changes have been documented on wiki.mtasa.com
• Add highlights to the news post
• Update your forum draft, asking for final feedback
• Await approval of news post

Don't forget to include:

• Resource contributors
• If you encounter an already documented new feature, note down the page authors

MTA Client News

This section is incomplete.

• Create MTA client news (see C:\ProgramData\MTA San Andreas All\1.5\news)
• Test to make sure it looks OK
• Use reloadnews command to help with development.
• Upload it to MTA server in rar format

Release

Code

• Make sure your local copies of branches master and release/xp-vista are up to date
• Bump version in code (e.g. https://github.com/multitheftauto/mtasa-blue/commit/0017cec99b0c90ac1ee37d47f14798b010c5928a)
• Merge master into xp-vista (git merge master)

Once distribution has begun

• Tag xp-vista using git tag 1.5.8-xp-vista release/xp-vista followed by git push origin 1.5.8-xp-vista (this must go first so that it is not on top of the list)
• Tag mainline using git tag 1.5.8 master and push using git push origin 1.5.8

Operations

• Wait for build server, or trigger it yourself.
• Bump on nightly update server.
• Once the update has begun distribution, push tags to the repo
• Create release on GitHub, with binary upload as well as a link to the news post. A summary is good as well.
• Bump wiki version
• Update linux.mtasa.com static version text, and the new files must be uploaded to the server as well
• If releasing a new major or minor (vX, vX.Y), make sure to check that our backends and tools support it, e.g: https://github.com/multitheftauto/mtadiag/blob/master/src/Diag.cpp#L445-L504
• Only single digit version numbers (vX.Y.Z) are supported

Social Media

Somewhere around distribution time

Publish forum news post! (It's okay if you are off by a little.)

After distribution has begun

• Announce on Discord (use @everyone and also publish to other guilds)
• Post on Facebook (this might be linked to twitter)
• Post on Twitter (this might be linked to facebook)
• Post on ModDB
• Post on Steam

Post-release

• Go to your kitchen and get a nice glass of water, because keeping hydrated is important.
• Pat yourself and the rest of the team on the back.
• Keep an eye out for complaints to make sure you haven't made a mistake and pushed something catastrophic.
• Don’t feel bad about bugs you introduced as all software has flaws. It happens.
• Work towards the next release!

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Authors: qaisjp