1. Set Environment variables

Set environment variables to document previous release tag, current release milestone, current release version, and git tag:

PREV_RELEASE=rel-1.0.0
MILESTONE=1.1
VERSION=1.1.0
TAG="rel-$VERSION"
BRANCH=master

These variables may be used later to copy/paste as answers to the script questions instead of typing the appropriate command when the time comes. These variables are not used by the scripts directly; therefore, there is no need to export the variables.

2. Create GitHub stats and finish release note

If a major release:

• merge any pull request notes into what's new:

  python tools/update_whatsnew.py
  

• update docs/source/whatsnew/development.rst, to ensure it covers the major release features

• move the contents of development.rst to versionX.rst where X is the numerical release version

• generate summary of GitHub contributions, which can be done with:

  python tools/github_stats.py --milestone $MILESTONE > stats.rst
  

  which may need some manual cleanup of stats.rst. Add the cleaned stats.rst results to docs/source/whatsnew/github-stats-X.rst where X is the numerical release version. If creating a major release, make a new github-stats-X.rst file; if creating a minor release, the content from stats.rst may simply be added to the top of an existing github-stats-X.rst file.

To find duplicates and update .mailmap, use:

git log --format="%aN <%aE>" $PREV_RELEASE... | sort -u -f

3. Run the tools/build_release script

Running tools/build_release does all the file checking and building that the real release script will do. This makes test installations, checks that the build procedure runs OK, and tests other steps in the release process.

We encourage creating a test build of the docs as well.

4. Create and push the new tag

Edit IPython/core/release.py to have the current version.

Commit the changes to release.py and jsversion:

git commit -am "release $VERSION"
git push origin $BRANCH

Create and push the tag:

git tag -am "release $VERSION" "$TAG"
git push origin --tags

Update release.py back to x.y-dev or x.y-maint, and push:

git commit -am "back to development"
git push origin $BRANCH

5. Get a fresh clone

Get a fresh clone of the tag for building the release:

cd /tmp
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/ipython/ipython.git -b "$TAG"

6. Run the release script

Run the release script:

cd tools && ./release

This makes the tarballs, zipfiles, and wheels. It posts them to archive.ipython.org and registers the release with PyPI.

This step requires having a current wheel, Python 3.4 and Python 2.7.

7. Draft a short release announcement

The announcement should include:

• release highlights
• a link to the html version of the What's new section of the documentation
• a link to upgrade or installation tips (if necessary)

Post the announcement to the mailing list, and link from Twitter.

8. Update milestones on GitHub

These steps will bring milestones up to date:

• close the just released milestone
• open a new milestone for the next release (x, y+1), if the milestone doesn't exist already

9. Update the IPython website

The IPython website should document the new release:

• add release announcement (news, announcements)
• update current version and download links
• update links on the documentation page (especially if a major release)

10. Celebrate!

Celebrate the release and please thank the contributors for their work. Great job!