Releasing Gas Town

Distribution Channels

How to Release

Option A: Automated (recommended)

Use the release formula, which handles all steps:

gt mol wisp create gastown-release --var version=X.Y.Z

Option B: Bump script

cd gastown/mayor/rig
./scripts/bump-version.sh X.Y.Z --commit --tag --push --install

Option C: Manual

1. Update CHANGELOG.md [Unreleased] section
2. Update internal/cmd/info.go versionChanges slice
3. Run ./scripts/bump-version.sh X.Y.Z (updates version.go, package.json, CHANGELOG header)
4. Commit, tag, push:

git add -A
git commit -m "chore: Bump version to X.Y.Z"
git tag -a vX.Y.Z -m "Release vX.Y.Z"
git push origin main
git push origin vX.Y.Z

5. Rebuild locally:

make install        # builds, codesigns, installs to ~/.local/bin
gt daemon stop && gt daemon start

What Happens After Tag Push

The release.yml workflow triggers automatically:

1. Verify tag matches Version constant — runs make check-version-tag and aborts the release if the pushed tag (vX.Y.Z) doesn't match the Version constant in internal/cmd/version.go. Prevents recurrence of #3459 where v0.13.0 shipped reporting 0.12.1.
2. goreleaser job builds binaries for all platforms and creates the GitHub Release
3. update-homebrew-formula job writes an asset-based formula to gastownhall/homebrew-gastown when tap credentials are configured
4. publish-npm job publishes to npm (best-effort, continue-on-error: true)

Manual dispatch is only for rerunning a release from a v* tag. Publishing jobs are guarded to skip branch refs.

Running the tag/version check locally

make check-version-tag

The target is a no-op on untagged HEADs, so it's safe to run on any checkout. It only fails when HEAD is tagged vX.Y.Z and the Version constant doesn't match. Run it after scripts/bump-version.sh and before pushing the tag if you want to catch drift before CI does.

Homebrew tap (gastownhall/gastown)

The release workflow automatically overwrites Formula/gastown.rb in the gastownhall/homebrew-gastown repo on every tag push. It prefers the GitHub App credentials HOMEBREW_TAP_APP_ID and HOMEBREW_TAP_APP_PRIVATE_KEY, and falls back to HOMEBREW_TAP_TOKEN if present.

The tap formula installs prebuilt release assets:

brew install gastownhall/gastown/gastown

Homebrew core

If Gastown is listed in homebrew-core, the formula lives at: https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew-core/blob/HEAD/Formula/g/gastown.rb

How it updates

Homebrew's BrewTestBot automatically detects new GitHub releases and opens a PR to homebrew-core. Gastown is on the autobump list — the bot checks every ~3 hours.

If the bot doesn't pick it up

Gastown is on the autobump list, so brew bump-formula-pr will refuse to submit a manual PR. If the bot hasn't updated after 6+ hours, check https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew-core/pulls?q=gastown for stuck PRs.

Verifying

brew update
brew info gastown    # Check version
brew upgrade gastown # Upgrade if installed

npm (@gastown/gt)

How it works

The workflow uses OIDC trusted publishing (npm provenance). No NPM_TOKEN secret is needed — the id-token: write permission on the job generates a short-lived OIDC token that npm trusts because the GitHub repo is linked to the npm package.

Prerequisites

The @gastown npm organization must exist and be linked to this repo:

1. Go to https://www.npmjs.com and create (or join) the @gastown org
2. Under org settings, enable "Require 2FA" and configure trusted publishing
3. Link gastownhall/gastown as a trusted publisher for @gastown/gt

Current status (as of 2026-03-06)

The @gastown npm org was secured by a community member (Ivan Casco Valero, [email protected]) to prevent scope squatting. Ownership transfer is pending. Until the org is transferred, npm publish will fail gracefully without blocking the release (continue-on-error: true in the workflow).

Verifying

npm view @gastown/gt version
npm install -g @gastown/gt
gt version

Files Updated During Release

Troubleshooting

GoReleaser fails with "replace directives"

The workflow rejects go.mod files with replace directives (they break go install). Remove the replace directive and commit before tagging.

npm publish returns 404

The @gastown npm org doesn't exist or you don't have publish access. See the npm section above. The release still succeeds — npm is best-effort.

Homebrew shows old version after a release

For the gastownhall/gastown tap, check the update-homebrew-formula job and the tap's Formula/gastown.rb commit history. For homebrew-core, check https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew-core/pulls?q=gastown for stuck BrewTestBot PRs. Manual brew bump-formula-pr is blocked for autobump formulae.

make install shows -dirty suffix

The .beads/ directory has unstaged changes. This is cosmetic ��� the version number is correct. The -dirty comes from git describe seeing any unstaged modifications.

Version in version.go is still old after bump script

The bump script reads the current version from version.go and replaces it. If version.go was manually edited to a different version, the script's sed pattern won't match. Fix version.go manually and re-run.