3 #+TITLE: Org maintainer tasks
6 This document describes the tasks the Org-mode maintainer has to do
7 and how they are performed.
11 The git repository has two branches:
13 - master :: for current development.
15 - maint :: for bug fixes against latest major or minor release.
17 Bug fixes always go on =maint= then are merged on =master=.
19 New features always go on =master=.
25 The release number for main releases look like this: =7.13=
27 Main releases are made whenever Org is in a state where the feature
28 set is consistent and we feel that the features that are implemented
29 is something we want to support in the future.
31 A major release turns the current state of the master branch into a
34 When doing a /major release/, make sure all changes from the maint
35 branch are merged into the the master branch, then merge the master
36 branch back into maint to synchronize the two.
40 The release number for minor releases look like this: =7.13.1=
42 Minor releases are small amends to main releases. Usually they fix
43 critical bugs discovered in a main release. Minor bugs are usually
44 not fixed -- they will be adressed in the next main release.
46 Only the fix to the bug is bundled into a release, without the main
47 development work going on in the master branch. Since the bug fix
48 will also be needed in the master branch, usually the fix is made in
49 maint then merged in master.
51 ** Tagging the release
53 When doing a major and a minor release, after all necessary merging is
54 done, tag the _maint_ branch for the release with:
56 git tag -a release_7.9.1 -m "Adding release tag"
62 We also encourage you to sign release tags like this:
64 git tag -s release_7.9.1 -m "Adding release tag"
66 ** Uploading the release files from the orgmode.org server
68 Log on the orgmode.org server as the emacs user and cd to
76 to create the .tar.gz and .zip files, the documentation, and to
77 upload everything at the right place.
79 * Available Org's builds on the server
81 There are two cron tasks on the server: one that builds the ELPA
82 packages and one that builds org-latest.tar.gz and org-latest.zip.
84 ELPA packages are built from the *maint* branch. One ELPA package
85 contains Org's core, another one called "org-plus-contrib" contains
86 Org and contributed libraries.
88 org-latest* snapshots are built from the *master* branch.
90 * Synchonization with Emacs
92 This is still a significant headache. Some hand work is needed here.
94 Emacs uses bzr. A useful introduction to bzr for Emacs developers can
95 be found [[http://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/BzrForEmacsDevs][here]]. While I see all the advantages this would have, I
96 cannot bring myself to switch away from git for my day-to-day work,
97 because I know git so well, and because git seems to me as being much
98 more powerful, conceptionally simple (once you have [[http://newartisans.com/2008/04/git-from-the-bottom-up/][bent your head
99 around it]]), and so much faster.
101 So the way I have been doing things with Emacs is this:
103 1. I do not update the version in Emacs too often. Just once every
104 few months - this is frequently enough for the Emacs release cycle.
105 Care must be taken to get in a *new and stable* version shortly
106 before Emacs goes into feature freeze and pretest, because that
107 version is going to be in the wild for a long time.
109 2. I watch the Emacs diffs for changes made by the maintainers of
110 Emacs in the org-mode files in Emacs. Any changes that come up
111 there, I merge into the development version of Org-mode.
112 Occasionally I do not do this, if I do not agree with a change.
113 The changes go into Org /without/ a ChangeLog-like entry in the
114 commit message. The reason for this is that we will later generate
115 a ChangeLog file from our commit messages, and I do not want double
116 ChangeLog entries in the Emacs ChangeLog file.
118 3. When I have made a release (usually I wait for the minor releases
119 to stabilize), I *copy* org files into the Emacs repository. Yes,
120 I do not merge, I copy. This has been the source of some problems
121 in the past - Emacs developers are not happy when I accidentally
122 overwrite changes they made. But I have not had the patience to
123 work out a better mechanism, and I really dislike the idea that the
124 version in Emacs starts diverging from my own.
126 Careful: Copy /org.texi/ and /orgcard.tex/ into the right places,
127 and also copy the lisp files with *two exceptions*: Do *not* copy
128 /org-colview-xemacs.el/ and /org-loaddefs.el/. The former does not
129 belong in Emacs. And the latter would actually be harmful because
130 Emacs generates its own autoloads.
132 4. Generate the ChangeLog entries
134 For this, I do in the org-mode git repository
136 : mk/make_emacs_changelog release_7.02.05..release_7.03.02
138 This will spit out ChangeLog entries (for the given commit range)
139 that need to go into the ChangeLog files in Emacs. Org-mode
140 contributes to 3 different ChangeLog files in Emacs:
142 : lisp/org/ChangeLog (for lisp changes)
143 : doc/misc/ChangeLog (for org.texi changes)
144 : etc/ChangeLog (for refcard changes)
146 When you run the =make_emacs_changelog= program, you will be
147 prompted for a date in ISO format YYYY-MM-DD, this date will be
148 used in the ChangeLog entries - Emacs developers want these dates
149 to be the time when the change has been installed into Emacs, not
150 the time when we made the change in our own repository. So all the
151 ChangeLog entries will get the same date. You will also be
152 prompted for the kind of ChangeLog you want to make, possible
153 answers are =lisp=, =texi=, and =card=. The program will then
154 select the correct entries for the specified ChangeLog file. If
155 you don't like being prompted, you can give the date and type as
156 second and third command line arguments to =make_emacs_changelog=,
159 : mk/make_emacs_changelog release_7.02.05..release_7.03.02 2010-12-11 lisp
161 These entries need to be added to the ChangeLog files in Emacs.
162 You should, in the ChangeLog file, select the inserted region of
163 new entries and do =M-x fill-region=, so that the entries are
164 formatted correctly. I then do look through the entries quickly to
165 make sure they are formatted properly, that the email addresses
168 5. Commit the changes into the bzr repository and you are done. Emacs
169 developers often look throught the commit and make minor changes -
170 these need to be merged back into our own repo.
172 * Updating the list of hooks/commands/options on Worg
174 Load the =mk/eldo.el= file then =M-x eldo-make-doc RET=.
176 This will produce an org file with the documentation.
178 Import this file into =worg/doc.org=, leaving the header untouched
179 (except for the release number).
181 Then commit and push the change on the =worg.git= repository.
183 * Copyright assignments
185 The maintainer needs to keep track of copyright assignments.
186 Even better, find a volunteer to do this.
188 The assignment form is included in the repository as a file that
189 you can send to contributors: =request-assign-future.txt=
191 The list of all contributors from who we have the papers is kept on
192 Worg at http://orgmode.org/worg/org-contribute.html, so that
193 committers can check if a patch can go into the core.
195 The assignment process does not allways go smoothly, and it has
196 happened several times that it gets stuck or forgotten at the FSF.
197 The contact at the FSF for this is: mailto:copyright-clerk@fsf.org
199 Emails from the paper submitter have been ignored in the past, but
200 an email from me (Carsten) as the maintainer of Org mode has usually
201 fixed such cases within a few days.