Hello,
I have spend some time on reading about changelogs. In GNU terminology ChangeLogs are
files describing changes in the source code [1] [2]. That is already handled for us by
Git, we don't need that. And that's also the reason why many projects don't
create ChangeLogs anymore. What we want is a NEWS file (in GNU terminology) [3]. This file
should describe shortly most important user-visible changes.
If you are curious, run:
$ find /usr/share/doc -name NEWS
I like this one:
/usr/share/doc/xz-5.0.1/NEWS
I would like to have a similar file inside AutoQA. At the same time we can stop writing
out changes into autoqa.spec. Spec file should describe only changes in packaging, not in
source code. And our change descriptions were too commit-specific anyway.
I have created a draft how could these files look like:
http://kparal.fedorapeople.org/autoqa/NEWS
http://kparal.fedorapeople.org/autoqa/autoqa.spec (see just %changelog section)
Note that the NEWS file is end-user oriented (full sentences, just most important stuff,
more readable that commit log) and very similar to what I posted to my blog as the release
announcement. That's the goal.
I haven't went far into the past when creating the entries, I don't see much
sense. Similarly for autoqa.spec, we incorrectly bumped release number in the past for new
autoqa releases. Deleted, ancient times available via Git. (I imagine the %changelog
section is used for new RPM builds to display changelogs. If it is not the case, I would
delete the whole section altogether, you can always see the data from Git).
If there are no objections I'll commit the changes and adjust the Release Process wiki
page.
Kamil
[1]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Changelog
[2]
http://www.gnu.org/prep/standards/html_node/Change-Logs.html
[3]
http://www.gnu.org/prep/standards/html_node/NEWS-File.html#NEWS-File