Topic on Talk:Release notes

format

(please correct in case of misconceptions)

At the moment, there are the wmf/1.35.0-wmf.3, the REL1_34 and the master branch. 1.33 (stable) is released, 1.34 (beta) isn't yet. 1.35 is marked as alpha, git master.

• REL1_34 - contains commits not in 1.33 that will be part of the 1.34 release(, if not reverted).
• master - contains commits not in 1.33 that will be part of the 1.35 release(, if not reverted). Most, if not all commits in REL1_34 are also in master. On the other hand, a (project manager|developer) could decide that a feature should not be part of 1.34 so you find the commit only in master (and not in REL1_34). Those features will become part of 1.35 -- at some point in the future the REL1_35 branch is created from master.
• wmf/1.35.0-wmf.\d - "Release" branches for the Wikimedia Wikis. While 1.34 isn't released, the Wikimedia Wikis receive changes from the master branch (1.35). There exist 3 groups of Wikis: The most less important always get the newest (highest) branch first (test.*, mediawiki.org) and the most important ones (en.wp) last. Having these branches helps applying "emergency" fixes and running Wikis with different Versions.

The confusing bit now is the definition of Date branched from master. For MediaWiki 1.34, is it the date the REL1_34 was created - REL1_34 may potentially start to contain different commits than master - or the date REL1_35 will be created - when REL1_34 will only receive bug fixes?

Theoretically it's already in that state (rc.0 having been released), but that's at the judgement call of people who are supporting particular features, who may choose to backport them (or supporting commits) to make transition easier for sysadmins using MediaWiki.