making a release cheat sheet (from 2013...needs to be updated)

tools/MakingARelease.md

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+## How to make a release of Jikes RVM
+
+1. Leading up to a release, here are the steps to take.  All commits are to head of master (default branch).
+    1. Update the release number in build.xml (will continue to have +hg suffix) and commit change
+    2. Export the userguide from confluence.  Update html and pdf versions of userguide and commit.
+    3. Update JIRA version management to indicate that version has been released.
+    4. Generate text release notes from JIRA and put them in NEWS.txt.  Commit.
+    5. Generate javadoc (apidoc target).  If needed, fix errors and commit changes.
+    6. Upload javadoc to static webspace on sourceforge (htdocs/apidocs/version).  Switch "latest" symlink to point to version.
+
+2. In a clean hg repository (no incoming/outgoing changesets). Perform the following steps
+    1. Switch to the release branch (hg update release)
+    2. Merge tip to the release branch (hg merge default; hg commit)
+    3. Edit build.xml to remove the +hg from the release number and set the hg.version field.  Commit
+    4. Tag the release (hg tag <version>; hg push)
+
+3. Clone a new .hg repository and create the release tar balls
+    1. hg clone http://hg.code.sourceforge.net/p/jikesrvm/code -b release jikesrvm-version
+    2. rm -rf jikesrvm/.hg
+    3. tar cjf jikesrvm-version.tar.bz2 jikesrvm-version;  tar czf jikesrvm-version.tar.gz jikesrvm-version;
+    4. Extract the portion of NEWS.txt relevant to this release into README.txt (will be used for ReleaseNotes on SF file download).
+
+4. Publish and announce the release
+    1. Upload release tar balls and README.txt to sourceforge; set it as default download using Files GUI.
+    2. Update the confluence Releases page to link to the new download version
+    3. Send out mail announcements to jikesrvm-announce and jikesrvm-researchers
+    4. Also post announcement in SF news and Confluence news.
+