0.8.7 release checklist

[hrkrshnn]

Checklist for making a release:

Requirements

• Lauchpad (Ubuntu One) account
• gnupg key (has to be version 1, gpg2 won't work) for your-name@ethereum.org created and uploaded
• Readthedocs account, access to the Solidity project
• Write access to https://github.com/ethereum/homebrew-ethereum

Documentation check

• Run make linkcheck from within docs/ and fix any broken links it finds. Ignore false positives caused by href anchors and dummy links not meant to work.

Blog Post

• Create a post on https://github.com/ethereum/solidity-blog and explain some of the new features or concepts.

Changelog

• Sort the changelog entries alphabetically and correct any errors you notice.
• Create a commit on a new branch that updates the Changelog to include a release date.
• Run ./scripts/tests.sh to update the bug list.
• Create a pull request and wait for the tests, merge it. (Set the release date and updated bugs_by_version.json #11784)

Create the Release

• Create Github release page: https://github.com/ethereum/solidity/releases/new (https://github.com/ethereum/solidity/releases/tag/untagged-bb8472b69f96d0c0f2d8)
• On the release page, select the develop branch as new target and set tag to the new version (e.g. v0.8.5) (make sure you only SAVE DRAFT instead of PUBLISH RELEASE before the actual release)
• Thank voluntary contributors in the Github release page (use git shortlog -s -n -e v0.5.3..origin/develop).
• Check that all tests on the latest commit in develop are green.
• Click the PUBLISH RELEASE button on the release page, creating the tag.
• Wait for the CI runs on the tag itself.

Download Binaries

• Take the solc.exe binary from the b_win_release run of the released commit in circle-ci and add it to the release page as solc-windows.exe.
• Take the solc binary from the b_osx run of the released commit in circle-ci and add it to the release page as solc-macos.
• Take the solc binary from the b_ubu_static run of the released commit in circle-ci and add it to the release page as solc-static-linux.
• Take the soljson.js binary from the b_ems run of the released commit in circle-ci and add it to the release page as soljson.js.

Update solc-bin

• Copy files to solc-bin:

  VERSION=0.8.4
  COMMIT="c7e474f2"
  SOLC_BIN="/home/me/solc-bin"
  chmod +x solc-static-linux solc-macos
  cp soljson.js $SOLC_BIN/bin/soljson-v$VERSION+commit.$COMMIT.js
  cp solc-static-linux $SOLC_BIN/linux-amd64/solc-linux-amd64-v$VERSION+commit.$COMMIT
  cp solc-macos $SOLC_BIN/macosx-amd64/solc-macosx-amd64-v$VERSION+commit.$COMMIT
  cp solc-windows.exe $SOLC_BIN/windows-amd64/solc-windows-amd64-v$VERSION+commit.$COMMIT.exe

• Run ./update --reuse-hashes in solc-bin and verify that the script has updated list.js, list.txt and list.json files correctly and that symlinks to the new release have been added in solc-bin/wasm/ and solc-bin/emscripten-wasm32/.
• Create a pull request and merge. (Solidity 0.8.7 solc-bin#96)

Homebrew and MacOS

• Update the version and the hash (sha256sum solidity_$VERSION.tar.gz) in https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew-core/blob/master/Formula/solidity.rb (Solidity 0.8.7 Homebrew/homebrew-core#83103)
• Update the version and the hash (sha256sum solidity_$VERSION.tar.gz) in https://github.com/ethereum/homebrew-ethereum/blob/master/solidity.rb (Update for solidity 0.8.7 ethereum/homebrew-ethereum#297)

Docker (@ekpyron)

• Run ./scripts/docker_deploy_manual.sh v$VERSION).

PPA (@ekpyron)

• Change scripts/release_ppa.sh to match your key's email and key id.
• Run scripts/release_ppa.sh v$VERSION to create the PPA release (you need the relevant openssl key).
• Wait for the ~ethereum/ubuntu/ethereum-static PPA build to be finished and published for all platforms. SERIOUSLY: DO NOT PROCEED EARLIER!!! After the static builds are published, copy the static package to the ~ethereum/ubuntu/ethereum PPA for the destination series Trusty, Xenial and Bionic while selecting Copy existing binaries.

Documentation (@franzihei)

• Build the new version on https://readthedocs.org/projects/solidity/ (select latest at the bottom of the page and click BUILD).
• In the admin panel, select Versions in the menu and set the default version to the released one.

Release solc-js (@hrkrshnn)

• Wait until solc-bin was properly deployed. You can test this via remix - a test run through remix is advisable anyway.
• Increment the version number, create a pull request for that, merge it after tests succeeded. (Set version to 0.8.7 solc-js#539)
• Run npm publish in the updated solc-js repository.
• Create a tag using git tag --annotate v$VERSION and push it with git push --tags.

Post-release

• Publish the blog post. (https://blog.soliditylang.org/2021/08/11/solidity-0.8.7-release-announcement/)
• Create a commit to increase the version number on develop in CMakeLists.txt and add a new skeleton changelog entry.
• Announce on Twitter, including links to the release and the blog post.
• Share announcement on Reddit and Solidity forum.
• Update the release information section on soliditylang.org.
• Lean back, wait for bug reports and repeat from step 1 :)

[franzihei]

Just did the last bits by announcing the release on Reddit and the forum. Here are the links:

• Twitter: https://twitter.com/solidity_lang/status/1425528300143796224
• Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/ethdev/comments/p2vei3/solidity_v087_is_out_adds_support_for_the_basefee/
• Forum: https://forum.soliditylang.org/t/solidity-v0-8-7-has-been-released-adds-support-for-the-basefee-opcode-and-more/453

I guess that concludes this release. Closing this issue, please re-open if you think something is still missing.