This sbt plugin provides a customizable release process that you can add to your project.
Notice: This README contains information for the latest release. Please refer to the documents for a specific version by looking up the respective tag.
- sbt 0.13.5+
- The version of the project should follow the semantic versioning scheme on semver.org with the following additions:
- The minor and bugfix (and beyond) part of the version are optional.
- There is no limit to the number of subversions you may have.
- The appendix after the bugfix part must be alphanumeric (
[0-9a-zA-Z]
) but may also contain dash characters-
. - These are all valid version numbers:
- 1.2.3
- 1.2.3-SNAPSHOT
- 1.2beta1
- 1.2-beta.1
- 1.2
- 1
- 1-BETA17
- 1.2.3.4.5
- 1.2.3.4.5-SNAPSHOT
- A publish repository configured. (Required only for the default release process. See further below for release process customizations.)
- git [optional]
Add the following lines to ./project/plugins.sbt
. See the section Using Plugins in the sbt website for more information.
addSbtPlugin("com.github.gseitz" % "sbt-release" % "1.0.11")
Since the build definition is actual Scala code, it's not as straight forward to change something in the middle of it as it is with an XML definition.
For this reason, sbt-release won't ever touch your build definition files, but instead writes the new release or development version to a file defined by the setting release-version-file
, which is set to file("version.sbt")
by default and points to $PROJECT_ROOT/version.sbt
.
By default the version is set on the build level (using version in ThisBuild
). This behavior can be controlled by setting releaseUseGlobalVersion
to false
, after which a version like version := "1.2.3"
will be written to version.sbt
.
The default release process consists of the following tasks:
- Check that the working directory is a git repository and the repository has no outstanding changes. Also prints the hash of the last commit to the console.
- If there are any snapshot dependencies, ask the user whether to continue or not (default: no).
- Ask the user for the
release version
and thenext development version
. Sensible defaults are provided. - Run
clean
. - Run
test:test
, if any test fails, the release process is aborted. - Write
version in ThisBuild := "$releaseVersion"
to the fileversion.sbt
and also apply this setting to the current build state. - Commit the changes in
version.sbt
. - Tag the previous commit with
v$version
(eg.v1.2
,v1.2.3
). - Run
publish
. - Write
version in ThisBuild := "nextVersion"
to the fileversion.sbt
and also apply this setting to the current build state. - Commit the changes in
version.sbt
.
In case of a failure of a task, the release process is aborted.
You can run a non-interactive release by providing the argument with-defaults
(tab completion works) to the release
command.
For all interactions, the following default value will be chosen:
- Continue with snapshots dependencies: no
- Release Version: current version without the qualifier (eg.
1.2-SNAPSHOT
->1.2
) - Next Version: increase the minor version segment of the current version and set the qualifier to '-SNAPSHOT' (eg.
1.2.1-SNAPSHOT
->1.3.0-SNAPSHOT
) - VCS tag: default is abort if the tag already exists. It is possible to override the answer to VCS by
default-tag-exists-answer
with one of:o
overridek
do not overwritea
abort (default)<tag-name>
an explicit custom tag name (e.g.1.2-M3
)
- VCS push:
- Abort if no remote tracking branch is set up.
- Abort if remote tracking branch cannot be checked (eg. via
git fetch
). - Abort if the remote tracking branch has unmerged commits.
You can set the release version using the argument release-version
and next version with next-version
.
Example:
release release-version 1.0.99 next-version 1.2.0-SNAPSHOT
For that emergency release at 2am on a Sunday, you can optionally avoid running any tests by providing the skip-tests
argument to the release
command.
Since version 0.7, sbt-release comes with built-in support for cross building and cross publishing. A cross release can be triggered in two ways:
-
via the setting
releaseCrossBuild
(by default set tofalse
) -
by using the option
cross
for therelease
command> release cross with-defaults
Combining both ways of steering a cross release, it is possible to generally disable automatic detection of cross release by using releaseCrossBuild := false
and running release cross
.
Of the predefined release steps, the clean
, test
, and publish
release steps are set up for cross building.
A cross release behaves analogous to using the +
command:
- If no
crossScalaVersions
are set, then runningrelease
orrelease cross
will not trigger a cross release (i.e. run the release with the scala version specified in the settingscalaVersion
). - If the
crossScalaVersions
setting is set, then only these scala versions will be used. Make sure to include the regular/defaultscalaVersion
in thecrossScalaVersions
setting as well.
In the section Customizing the release process we take a look at how to define a ReleaseStep
to participate in a cross build.
As of version 0.8, sbt-release comes with four strategies for computing the next snapshot version via the releaseVersionBump
setting. These strategies are defined in sbtrelease.Version.Bump
. By default, the Next
strategy is used:
Major
: always bumps the major part of the versionMinor
: always bumps the minor part of the versionBugfix
: always bumps the bugfix part of the versionNano
: always bumps the nano part of the versionNext
: bumps the last version part (e.g.0.17
->0.18
,0.11.7
->0.11.8
,3.22.3.4.91
->3.22.3.4.92
)
Example:
releaseVersionBump := sbtrelease.Version.Bump.Major
sbt-release comes with two settings for deriving the release version and the next development version from a given version.
These derived versions are used for the suggestions/defaults in the prompt and for non-interactive releases.
Let's take a look at the types:
val releaseVersion : SettingKey[String => String]
val releaseNextVersion : SettingKey[String => String]
The default settings make use of the helper class Version
that ships with sbt-release.
// strip the qualifier off the input version, eg. 1.2.1-SNAPSHOT -> 1.2.1
releaseVersion := { ver => Version(ver).map(_.withoutQualifier.string).getOrElse(versionFormatError(ver)) }
// bump the version and append '-SNAPSHOT', eg. 1.2.1 -> 1.3.0-SNAPSHOT
releaseNextVersion := {
ver => Version(ver).map(_.bump(releaseVersionBump.value).asSnapshot.string).getOrElse(versionFormatError(ver))
},
If you want to customize the versioning, keep the following in mind:
-
releaseVersion
- input: the current development version
- output: the release version
-
releaseNextVersion
- input: the release version (either automatically 'chosen' in a non-interactive build or from user input)
- output: the next development version
sbt-release has built in support to commit/push to Git, Mercurial and Subversion repositories. The messages for the tag and the commits can be customized to your needs with these settings:
val releaseTagComment : TaskKey[String]
val releaseCommitMessage : TaskKey[String]
// defaults
releaseTagComment := s"Releasing ${(version in ThisBuild).value}",
releaseCommitMessage := s"Setting version to ${(version in ThisBuild).value}",
SBT is able to publish signed releases using the sbt-pgp plugin.
After setting that up for your project, you can then tell sbt-release to use it by setting the releasePublishArtifactsAction
key:
releasePublishArtifactsAction := PgpKeys.publishSigned.value
The release process can be customized to the project's needs.
- Not using Git? Then rip it out.
- Want to check for the existence of release notes at the start of the release and then publish it with posterous-sbt at the end? Just add the release step.
The release process is defined by State transformation functions (State => State
), for which sbt-release defines this case class:
case class ReleaseStep (
action: State => State,
check: State => State = identity,
enableCrossBuild: Boolean = false
)
The function action
is used to perform the actual release step. Additionally, each release step can provide a check
function that is run at the beginning of the release and can be used to prevent the release from running because of an unsatisfied invariant (i.e. the release step for publishing artifacts checks that publishTo is properly set up). The property enableCrossBuild
tells sbt-release whether or not a particular ReleaseStep
needs to be executed for the specified crossScalaVersions
.
The sequence of ReleaseStep
s that make up the release process is stored in the setting releaseProcess: SettingKey[Seq[ReleaseStep]]
.
The state transformations functions used in sbt-release are the same as the action/body part of a no-argument command. You can read more about building commands in the sbt website.
There are basically 2 ways to creating a new ReleaseStep
:
You can define your own state tansformation functions, just like sbt-release does, for example:
val checkOrganization = ReleaseStep(action = st => {
// extract the build state
val extracted = Project.extract(st)
// retrieve the value of the organization SettingKey
val org = extracted.get(Keys.organization)
if (org.startsWith("com.acme"))
sys.error("Hey, no need to release a toy project!")
st
})
We will later see how to let this release step participate in the release process.
Sometimes you just want to run an existing task or command. This is especially useful if the task raises an error in case something went wrong and therefore interrupts the release process.
sbt-release comes with a few convenience functions for converting tasks and commands to release steps:
releaseStepTask
- Run an individual task. Does not aggregate builds.releaseStepTaskAggregated
- Run an aggregated task.releaseStepInputTask
- Run an input task, optionally taking the input to pass to it.releaseStepCommand
- Run a command.
For example:
releaseProcess := Seq[ReleaseStep](
releaseStepInputTask(testOnly, " com.example.MyTest"),
releaseStepInputTask(scripted),
releaseStepTask(publish in subproject),
releaseStepCommand("sonatypeRelease")
)
I highly recommend to make yourself familiar with the State API before you continue your journey to a fully customized release process.
Yes, and as a start, let's take a look at the default definition of releaseProcess
:
import ReleaseTransformations._
// ...
releaseProcess := Seq[ReleaseStep](
checkSnapshotDependencies, // : ReleaseStep
inquireVersions, // : ReleaseStep
runClean, // : ReleaseStep
runTest, // : ReleaseStep
setReleaseVersion, // : ReleaseStep
commitReleaseVersion, // : ReleaseStep, performs the initial git checks
tagRelease, // : ReleaseStep
publishArtifacts, // : ReleaseStep, checks whether `publishTo` is properly set up
setNextVersion, // : ReleaseStep
commitNextVersion, // : ReleaseStep
pushChanges // : ReleaseStep, also checks that an upstream branch is properly configured
)
The names of the individual steps of the release process are pretty much self-describing.
Notice how we can just reuse the publish
task by utilizing the releaseTask
helper function,
but keep in mind that it needs to be properly scoped (more info on Scopes).
Note, the commitReleaseVersion
step requires that the working directory has no untracked files by default. It will abort the release in this case. You may disable this check
by setting the releaseIgnoreUntrackedFiles
key to true
.
Let's modify the previous release process and remove the Git related steps, who uses that anyway.
import ReleaseTransformations._
// ...
ReleaseKeys.releaseProcess := Seq[ReleaseStep](
checkOrganization, // Look Ma', my own release step!
checkSnapshotDependencies,
inquireVersions,
runTest,
setReleaseVersion,
publishArtifacts,
setNextVersion
)
Overall, the process stayed pretty much the same:
- The Git related steps were left out.
- Our
checkOrganization
task was added in the beginning, just to be sure this is a serious project.
Now let's also add steps for posterous-sbt:
import posterous.Publish._
import ReleaseTransformations._
// ...
val publishReleaseNotes = (ref: ProjectRef) => ReleaseStep(
check = releaseStepTaskAggregated(check in Posterous in ref), // upfront check
action = releaseStepTaskAggregated(publish in Posterous in ref) // publish release notes
)
// ...
ReleaseKeys.releaseProcess <<= thisProjectRef apply { ref =>
import ReleaseStateTransformations._
Seq[ReleaseStep](
checkOrganization,
checkSnapshotDependencies,
inquireVersions,
runTest,
setReleaseVersion,
publishArtifacts,
publishReleaseNotes(ref) // we need to forward `thisProjectRef` for proper scoping of the underlying tasks
setNextVersion
)
}
The check
part of the release step is run at the start, to make sure we have everything set up to post the release notes later on.
After publishing the actual build artifacts, we also publish the release notes.
Thank you, Jason and Mark, for your feedback and ideas.
Johannes Rudolph, Espen Wiborg, Eric Bowman, Petteri Valkonen, Gary Coady, Alexey Alekhin, Andrew Gustafson, Paul Davies, Stanislav Savulchik, Tim Van Laer, Lars Hupel
Copyright (c) 2011-2014 Gerolf Seitz
Published under the Apache License 2.0