docs: Add documentation for releases and commit style

mafredri · mafredri · commit 989ac1211e99 · 2023-01-11T18:21:01.000Z
diff --git a/docs/CONTRIBUTING.md b/docs/CONTRIBUTING.md
@@ -199,3 +199,51 @@ one or more reviewers making new comments every time, then waiting for an
 updated change before reviewing again. All contributors, including those from
 maintainers, are subject to the same review cycle; this process is not meant to
 be applied selectively or to discourage anyone from contributing.
+
+## Releases
+
+Coder releases are automated via GitHub Actions. Specifically, the
+[`release.yaml`](../.github/workflows/release.yaml) workflow. They are created
+based on the current [`main`](https://github.com/coder/coder/tree/main) branch.
+
+The release notes for a release are automatically generated from commit titles
+and metadata from PRs that are merged into `main`.
+
+### Creating a release (script)
+
+The preferred way to create a release is to use [`./scripts/release.sh`](../scripts/release.sh). This script will show a preview of the release that _would_ be created and if you choose to continue, automatically run and watch the release workflow for you.
+
+See `./scripts/release.sh --help` for more information.
+
+### Creating a release (workflow dispatch)
+
+Alternatively, the workflow can be dispatched manually from [Actions: Release](https://github.com/coder/coder/actions/workflows/release.yaml). Simply press "Run workflow" and set your preferred inputs.
+
+### Commit messages
+
+Commit messages should follow the [Conventional Commits 1.0.0](https://www.conventionalcommits.org/en/v1.0.0/) specification.
+
+Allowed commit types (`feat`, `fix`, etc.) are listed in [conventional-commit-types](https://github.com/commitizen/conventional-commit-types/blob/c3a9be4c73e47f2e8197de775f41d981701407fb/index.json). Note that these types are also used to automatically sort and organize the release notes.
+
+A good commit message title uses the imperative, present tense and is ~50
+characters long (no more than 72).
+
+Examples:
+
+- Good: `feat(api): Add feature X`
+- Bad: `feat(api): Added feature X` (past tense)
+
+A good rule of thumb for writing good commit messages is to recite: [If applied, this commit will ...](https://reflectoring.io/meaningful-commit-messages/).
+
+**Note:** We lint PR titles to ensure they follow the Conventional Commits specification, however, it's still possible to merge PRs on GitHub with a badly formatted title. Take care when merging single-commit PRs as GitHub may prefer to use the original commit title instead of the PR title.
+
+### Breaking changes
+
+Breaking changes can be triggered in two ways:
+
+- Add `!` to the commit message title, e.g. `feat(api)!: Remove deprecated endpoint /test`
+- Add the [`release/breaking`](https://github.com/coder/coder/issues?q=sort%3Aupdated-desc+label%3Arelease%2Fbreaking) label to a PR that has, or will be, merged into `main`.
+
+### Security
+
+The [`security`](https://github.com/coder/coder/issues?q=sort%3Aupdated-desc+label%3Asecurity) label can be added to PRs that have, or will be, merged into `main`. Doing so will make sure the change stands out in the release notes.
diff --git a/scripts/release.sh b/scripts/release.sh
@@ -7,7 +7,7 @@ cdroot
 
 usage() {
 	cat <<EOH
-Usage: ./release.sh [--branch <name>] [--draft] [--dry-run] [--ref <ref>] [--major | --minor | --patch]
+Usage: ./release.sh [-h | --help] [--draft] [--dry-run] [--major | --minor | --patch]
 
 This script should be called to create a new release.
 
@@ -17,23 +17,38 @@ based on if the release contains breaking changes or not. If the release
 contains breaking changes, a new minor version will be created. Otherwise, a
 new patch version will be created.
 
-Set --ref if you need to specify a specific commit that the new version will
-be tagged at, otherwise the latest commit will be used.
+To mark a release as containing breaking changes, the commit title should
+either contain a known prefix with an exclamation mark ("feat!:",
+"feat(api)!:") or the PR that was merged can be tagged with the
+"release/breaking" label.
+
+GitHub labels that affect release notes:
+
+- release/breaking: Shown under BREAKING CHANGES, prevents patch release.
+- security: Shown under SECURITY.
+
+Flags:
+
+Set --major or --minor to force a larger version bump, even when there are no
+breaking changes. By default a patch version will be created, --patch is no-op.
 
-Set --minor to force a minor version bump, even when there are no breaking
-changes. Likewise for --major. By default a patch version will be created.
+Set --draft to create a draft release, this is to allow you to modify release
+notes in the GitHub UI before publishing.
 
 Set --dry-run to run the release workflow in CI as a dry-run (no release will
 be created).
 
-To mark a release as containing breaking changes, the commit title should
-either contain a known prefix with an exclamation mark ("feat!:",
-"feat(api)!:") or the PR that was merged can be tagged with the
-"release/breaking" label.
+Development:
+
+Usage: ./release.sh [-h | --help] [--branch <branch>] [--draft] [--dry-run] [--major | --minor | --patch] [--ref <ref>]
+
+Flags:
+
+Set --ref if you need to specify a specific commit that the new version will
+be tagged at, otherwise the latest commit will be used.
 
-To test changes to this script, you can set --branch <my-branch>, which will
-run the release workflow in CI as a dry-run and use the latest commit on the
-specified branch as the release commit. This will also set --dry-run.
+Set --branch if you are testing changes to the release process on a custom
+branch. This flag implies --dry-run and no actual release will be created.
 EOH
 }
 
