Generate changelog entries

[slindberg]

This the last big PITA left in the release process (for me personally). Changelogs are only as helpful as they are readable, which makes them difficult to auto-generate.

Good changelog entires include:

• Scannable formatting
• Tag name
• Human readable date
• Aggregated changes
  • Concise explanations
  • References (i.e. Github issue links)
  • Attributions (i.e. Github handles)
• Meta information
  • Breaking changes
  • Upgrade instructions

The sanest path to generating entries is probably to go off of Github issues, or perhaps just merge commits (although integrating with Github could be beneficial for other reasons). Regardless, it would require introducing an editor step into the release process so that line items and meta information can be changed/added.

Another hurdle is how to handle changelogs for projects that maintain several stable branches, e.g. v1.13.x, v2.0.x, v2.x. The changelog for the latest/default stable branch (master) should include entries for all versions so that all releases are in one scannable place.

[rwjblue]

Was chatting with @runspired about this yesterday. Hoping he chimes in...

[runspired]

Chiming in :P

[rwjblue]

He is working on ember-cli-changelog which provides a command and plans to hook into our beforeCommit hook.

[runspired]

@slindberg I have a full addon about to be released that does this well, hit me up on slack and we can discuss if the direction makes sense to you or what alterations you would make.

[runspired]

(also, releasing an alpha tonight, got bogged down with a bugfix on another addon that held it back)

[carlesnunez]

This will be so usefull 👍

[MiguelMadero]

Whats the state of this? I started looking at semantic-release, but isnt a perfect fit for addons and was wondering wether I should change that or this.

[webark]

ya, I'm in the same place as you @MiguelMadero .. @runspired what was the addon you had?

[webark]

@runspired did that ever come to fruition?

[RobbieTheWagner]

I'm working on https://github.com/html-next/ember-cli-changelog and getting it up to date and working again, if anyone wants to help out!