How to release the next version of DevTools

Create a branch for your release.

cd ~/path/to/devtools
git checkout master
git pull upstream master
git checkout -b release_2.7.0

Prepare the release

Update the DevTools version number

Run the update_version.dart script with the new DevTools version.

dart tool/update_version.dart 2.7.0

Verify that this script updated the pubspecs under packages/ and updated all references to those packages. These packages always have their version numbers updated in lock, so we don't have to worry about versioning. Also make sure that the version constant in packages/devtools_app/lib/devtools.dart was updated.

Update the CHANGELOG.md

Use the tool generate-changelog to automatically update the packages/devtools/CHANGELOG.md file.

cd ~/path/to/devtools
dart tool/bin/repo_tool.dart generate-changelog

Be sure to manually check that the version for the CHANGELOG entry was correctly generated and that the entries don't have any syntax errors. The generate-changelog script is intended to do the bulk of the work, but still needs manual review.

Push the local branch

git add .
git commit -m “Prepare for 2.7.0 release.”
git push origin release_2.7.0

From the git GUI tool or from github.com directly, create a PR, send for review, then squash and commit after receiving an LGTM.

Test the release

Checkout the commit you just created, or remain on the branch you just landed the prep PR from.

git checkout 8881a7caa9067471008a8e00750b161f53cdb843

Build the DevTools binary and run it from your local Dart SDK. From the main devtools/ directory.

dart ./tool/build_e2e.dart

Launch DevTools and verify that everything generally works.

• open the page in a browser (http://localhost:53432)
• flutter run an application
• connect to the running app from DevTools, verify that the pages generally work and that there are no exceptions in the chrome devtools log

If you find any release blocking issues, fix them before releasing. Then grab the latest commit hash that includes both the release prep commit and the bug fixes, and use this commit hash for the following steps.

Once the build is in good shape, you can revert any local changes and proceed to the next step.

git checkout .
git clean -f -d

Tag the release

Checkout the commit from which you want to release DevTools (likely the commit for the PR you just landed). You can run git log -v to see the commits. Run the tag_version.sh script to create a tag on the flutter/devtools repo for this release. This script will automatically determine the version from packages/devtools/pubspec.yaml so there is no need to manually enter the version.

tool/tag_version.sh

Upload the DevTools binary to CIPD

Using the commit hash you want to release DevTools from (this should match the commit hash for the tag you just created) and the update.sh script, build and upload the DevTools binary to CIPD.

cd path/to/dart-sdk/sdk
git rebase-update
third_party/devtools/update.sh 8881a7caa9067471008a8e00750b161f53cdb843

Update the DevTools hash in the Dart SDK

Navigate to your local checkout of the Dart SDK (for getting started instructions, see sdk/CONTRIBUTING.md).

Create new branch for your changes:

git new-branch dt-release

Update the devtools_rev entry in the Dart SDK DEPS file with the git commit hash you just built DevTools from (this is the id for the CIPD upload in the previous step). See this example CL.

Verify that running dart devtools launches the version of DevTools you just released. You'll need to build the dart sdk locally to do this.

cd path/to/dart-sdk/sdk
gclient sync -D
./tools/build.py -mrelease -ax64 create_sdk
out/ReleaseX64/dart-sdk/bin/dart devtools  # On OSX replace 'out' with 'xcodebuild'

If the version of DevTools you just published to CIPD loads properly, push up the SDK CL for review.

git add .
git commit -m "Bump DevTools DEP to 2.16.0"
git cl upload -s

Publish package:devtools_shared on pub

package:devtools_shared is the only DevTools package that is published on pub. From the devtools/packages/devtools_shared directory, run:

pub publish

Write release notes for the release

Release notes should contain details about the user-facing changes included in the release. These notes are shown directly in DevTools when a user opens a new version of DevTools. Please see the release notes README.md for details on where to add release notes and how to test them.