# Release process

1. Create a new 'milestone' for the next release and move all issues
   present in the current release milestone.
1. Verification of release notes: ensure that release notes
   ([NEWS](NEWS)) exist for this release, and include all significant
   changes since last release.
1. Update of release date in [NEWS](NEWS), and bump of version number
   in [configure.ac](configure.ac) as well as soname numbers in
   [m4/hooks.m4](m4/hooks.m4).
1. Remove the last section of
   [devel/libgnutls.abignore](devel/libgnutls.abignore), update the
   *.abi files under [devel/abi-dump](devel/abi-dump) submodule, run
   `make abi-dump-latest`, and push any changes to the [abi-dump
   repository]; then do `make abi-check`
1. Create a distribution tarball: note that this requires
   the documentation (not only the library docs but also the Guile binding
   docs) to be generated. See the `doc-dist.Fedora` job in
   [.gitlab-ci.yml](.gitlab-ci.yml), which does the same thing in the CI:
   ```console
   # Install necesarry packages for documentation and Guile bindings, set
   # environment variables such as GUILE, GUILD, and guile_snarf, and then:
   make distcheck
   ```
1. Create a detached GPG signature:
   ```console
   gpg --detach-sign --user your-key-id gnutls-$VERSION.tar.xz
   ```
1. Create a git tag and push it: use [git-evtag] if possible; at least use
   GPG-signed tag:
   ```console
   git tag -s $VERSION
   git push --atomic origin $VERSION
   ```
1. Upload the tarball and the signature to ftp.gnupg.org:
   ```console
   scp gnutls-$VERSION.tar.xz* ftp.gnupg.org:/home/ftp/gcrypt/gnutls/v$(expr $VERSION : '\([0-9]*\.[0-9]*\)')/
   ```
1. Download `mingw32/archive` artifact for new release from [CI/CD jobs].
   Rename downloaded zip file to `gnutls-$VERSION-w32.zip`.
   Create a detached GPG signature.
   Upload zip and signature files to ftp.gnupg.org.
   Do the same analogically for `mingw64/archive`.
1. Create and send announcement email based on previously sent email
   to the list and [NEWS](NEWS) file.
1. Create a [NEWS entry] and/or a [security advisory entry] at
   [web-pages repository] if necessary. The NEWS entry is usually
   pointing to the announcement email. A commit auto-generates the
   [gnutls web site].
1. Optionally announce the release on the @GnuTLS twitter account.
1. Close the current release milestone.

[abi-dump repository]: https://gitlab.com/gnutls/abi-dump
[NEWS entry]: https://gitlab.com/gnutls/web-pages/-/tree/master/news-entries
[security advisory entry]: https://gitlab.com/gnutls/web-pages/-/tree/master/security-entries
[web-pages repository]: https://gitlab.com/gnutls/web-pages/
[gnutls web site]: https://gnutls.gitlab.io/web-pages/
[git-evtag]: https://github.com/cgwalters/git-evtag
[CI/CD jobs]: https://gitlab.com/gnutls/gnutls/-/jobs