View source for Release:General Information

This is the page dedicated to release maintainers and testers.

== Source Releases ==

There are release howtos in both the gimp-2-8 and the master branch:

* https://git.gnome.org/browse/gimp/tree/devel-docs/release-howto.txt?h=gimp-2-8
* https://git.gnome.org/browse/gimp/tree/devel-docs/release-howto.txt?h=master

They are currently different, for the sole reason that the most recent editor of the file is pretending to be the 2.8 release manager and doesn't care that much about 2.9 development releases :)

Following these howtos is important for getting consistent and complete release tarballs.

Important: making a release is a process, not an instantaneous event. 

* plan ahead
* announce planned releases a few weeks in advance to the gnome-i18n list to get translations updated
* make changes before you do the release 
** for example, update the NEWS
** prepare a local branch for the website changes
** familiarize yourself with the tools


== Microsoft Windows release ==

'''Current release maintainers''': Ender (stable) and Drawoc (nightly).

=== Procedure ===

The stable release procedure uses some scripts available [http://eternallybored.org/misc/gimp/ there] and some files in `build/windows/` in GIMP repository.
But the exact procedure and how to use these scripts seems to be unknown to all but Ender.

There exists also a nightly build system maintained by Drawoc, using jhbuild and files in `build/windows/jhbuild/` in GIMP repository.

=== NOTES ===

1) Two ''fontconfig'' configuration issues specific to the Windows build must be taken care of in the release:

* The [https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=708110 conf.d path bug]: fixed either with a patch in the repo (`build/windows/jhbuild/patches/fontconfig-fix-config-dir.patch`) or by using fontconfig >= 2.11.0.

* [https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=703331 Better fontconfig cache directory]: still in discussion upstream, but if we feel this is the way, we should already apply the [https://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=71691 patch available on Freedesktop bug tracker].

2) Make sure the following Windows registry keys are set/updated to the right value:

 [HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\SystemFileAssociations\image\shell\Edit with GIMP]
 @=”Edit with GIMP”
 
 [HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\SystemFileAssociations\image\shell\Edit with GIMP\command]
 @=”\”C:\\Program Files\\GIMP 2\\bin\\gimp-2.10.exe\” \”%1\””

It seems to be a common problem that the "Open with GIMP" right click menu gets lost on some update. Let's make sure this is not the case (see [https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=752759 bug 752759]).

=== TODO ===

* Sync the nightly and the stable release procedures.

* Write down the exact procedure (both on this wiki and in the repo, for instance, it could be in `build/windows/README.release`), so that anyone could be able to build one's own non-official release (whether for testing, development, or simply to pass down the information).

* All the files necessary for the release should be available in the repo. There should not be files available spread out on third-party servers.

== OSX Release ==

'''Current release maintainers''': ?

There are at least four people working on an OS X release: Clayton Walker, Simone Karin Lehmann, Partha Bagchi and David Evans (Macports), not to mention the (still active?) maintainer of the outdated Fink build.

=== Procedure ===

''TODO''

=== Notes ===

Clayton Walker proposed to update the ''fontconfig'' cache directory for the OSX build, but it has been [https://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=71715 rejected upstream].

Well maybe all the OSX package maintainers and developers in our team could discuss this, and if they all agreed a change in fontconfig cache was in order for the OSX build, well you can configure it appropriately. Even though a change upstream is nicer, that's still only a configuration change, so we should do it.

=== TODO ===

* All maintainers struggle alone with the special build issues of GIMP on OS X, its dependencies and the API incompatibilities between the various OS X versions.
Can you guys and girls please find a way to work together?
Ideally there would be only one GIMP release. Nevertheless if API/dependency incompatibilities were to force us to make several OSX releases, we should still have a common procedure to facilitate the work.

* If we manage to sync all the OSX releases, the chosen procedure should be written down (both on this wiki and in the repo, for instance, it could be in `build/osx/README.release`).

* All release scripts and other necessary files should be added to the repository at `build/osx/`.