Assemble-changelog

Release-time changelog assembly for the Rerun repo.

Always work in the root of a standalone rerun-io/rerun checkout — normally the prepare-release-0.x.y branch, where the result is committed. This is step 4 of RELEASES.md; read it for the surrounding context.

Before doing any release work, verify that the current directory is the repository root and that its origin is rerun-io/rerun:

test "$(git rev-parse --show-toplevel)" = "$PWD"
git remote get-url origin

Do not run the workflow in the reality monorepo, including from its rerun/ directory. The release scripts need the standalone repository's 0.x.y tags and resolve (#N) commit references against rerun-io/rerun. Running them against reality can silently resolve reality PR numbers to unrelated Rerun PRs.

If either precondition is not met, stop before running any release command. Tell the user that the skill requires the root of a standalone rerun-io/rerun checkout, and ask them to restart it there. Do not clone a repository, fetch tags, or switch branches for the user.

Resolve the target version from $ARGUMENTS (e.g. 0.34.0). If absent, read it from Cargo.toml (version = "0.x.y-…") and confirm with the user.

Workflow

1. Assemble upcoming/ → the release changeset

The curated entries live one-file-per-PR in docs/content/changelog/upcoming/*.md (skip _template.md). Each declares type: highlight|breaking|feature in its frontmatter. Merge them into docs/content/changelog/changeset-0-XX.md, creating that file from docs/content/changelog/_template.md if it does not exist yet (set title to the version — keep it quoted, e.g. title: "0.36", so YAML keeps it a string — and order one lower than the previous release):

• highlight → fold into the ## Highlights prose (write a cohesive few sentences selling the release; use the entries as raw material, don't just concatenate).
• feature → one ### subsection each under ## New features.
• breaking → one ### subsection each under ## Breaking changes. If none, write None..

Keep the sections in that order. The changelog is user-facing (it's part of the website), so it leads with what's new; the verbose, developer-only breaking-change migration guides go last so most readers don't have to scroll past them.

Tailor the output to the release type:

• Patch release (0.x.Y, Y > 0) → typically only bug fixes. Skip Highlights and New features (there usually won't be upcoming/ entries anyway); keep Breaking changes only if there are any.
• Minor release (0.X.0) → the full template: highlights, new features, breaking changes.

Preserve each entry's prose and structure (migration guides, tables, snippet: directives, screenshots, links). De-duplicate overlapping entries and order breaking changes most-impactful first. Drop the per-entry frontmatter.

Relative doc links in entries were written as if from changelog/ (e.g. ../reference/migration/...), which is correct once merged — keep them as-is.

Finally, point the redirect: frontmatter in docs/content/changelog.md at changelog/changeset-0-XX: CI's scripts/ci/check_changelog_redirect.py requires the newest changeset to be the redirect target, so the repoint must land together with the new changeset.

2. Resolve release blockers

Ensure that every non-template file from upcoming/ was merged into the changeset, then search the assembled changeset for unresolved placeholders:

rg -n 'TODO\([^)]+\)' docs/content/changelog/changeset-0-XX.md # NOLINT

Resolve every match before continuing. An unresolved TODO(name) blocks the release.

3. Generate the summary and detail sections into CHANGELOG.md

pixi run uvpy scripts/generate_changelog.py --version 0.x.y

Edit PR titles/labels to improve the output, then copy the result into CHANGELOG.md (drop the trailing "Chronological changes" section; replace the placeholder video/blogpost lines as previous releases did). Spot-check a few entries against the actual PRs: polluted titles (old, unrelated PRs; thanks @… for core team members) mean a PR-number lookup misfired — see the warning at the top.

Do this after step 1: the script reads the assembled changeset and emits a summary of it (section headings + links to the changeset on the website), rather than inlining its prose. CHANGELOG.md therefore never duplicates the changeset — if the changeset is missing, the script emits an unresolved placeholder instead.

4. Empty the inbox

Delete the merged upcoming/*.md entries, keeping _template.md:

find docs/content/changelog/upcoming -maxdepth 1 -type f -name '*.md' ! -name '_template.md' -exec git rm -- {} +

Checklist before declaring done

• Every non-template upcoming/ entry is represented in the changeset.
• No TODO(name) remains in the changeset.
• ## Highlights reads as a coherent whole, not a list of fragments.
• upcoming/ contains only _template.md.
• python scripts/ci/check_changelog_redirect.py passes (redirect points at this changeset).

Notes

• This skill lives in skills/assemble-changelog in the standalone Rerun repository.
• Synced commits in rerun-io/rerun carry a Source-Ref trailer (the reality merge commit); generate_changelog.py resolves it back to the originating reality PR for correct titles, labels, and contributors.
• The next release's changeset is not pre-created: an empty changeset for an unreleased version would make check_changelog_redirect.py fail, since it requires the newest changeset-0-xx.md to be the redirect target. During a cycle, upcoming/ is the only in-flight artifact.