User:Tracy Graydon/Release Process

Yocto Release Procedures

This document explains the steps in publishing an official Yocto Project release. This is intended to be a HOWTO Release Guide.

Yocto Project Naming Conventions

Yocto Project releases fall into four main types:

• Major Ex. yocto-2.0
• Minor Ex. yocto-2.1
• Point (aka "patch" release) Ex. yocto-2.1.1
• Milestone Ex. yocto-2.3_M3

A full explanation of release naming conventions, release types, and background can be found here: https://wiki.yoctoproject.org/wiki/Yocto_Project_Release_Process

General Steps for a Release:

• Stage the release candidate.
• Generate or obtain release notes, if applicable.
• Stage/create the Release documentation on YoctoProject.org (unpublished but ready to go).
• Sync the release to the downloads area in preparation for sync to external mirrors.
• Sign the release notes.
• Sync to external mirrors.
• Tag the git repos.
• Publish the yoctoproject.org pages.
• Test the links to make sure everything works.
• Announce the release.

Release Matrix

For Major, Minor, and Point releases, the release artifacts and collateral are the same. For Milestone releases, we publishing is minimal. The table below shows what is released per each release type.

	Major/Minor	Point	Milestone
Yoctoproject.org Docs	Yes	Yes	No
YoctoProject.org Release Page	Yes	Yes	No
BSP Pages	Yes	Yes	No
Eclipse Plugin Pages	Yes	Yes	No
BuildAppliance Page	Yes	Yes	No
Buildtools Page	Yes	Yes	No
Release Notes (signed)	Yes	Yes	No
Tag Release	Yes	Yes	Yes
Email Announcement	Yes	Yes	Yes