ChangeLog expects commit messages to follow the Conventional Commits Specification. Messages that use that format can be parsed and included in the generated change log.
The parser has two modes:
- Strict mode enforces commit messages to follow the specification precisely.
- Loose mode is more lenient and allows minor deviations from the specification.
By default, the Loose mode is used. For documentation on how to change the parser mode, see Configuration.
The differences between Strict and Loose modes are listed below.
In loose mode, all trailing blank lines at the end of the commit message are ignored. The following commit message is valid in Loose mode but invalid in Strict mode:
feat: New Feature
Description of the feature
Blank lines separate the commit message header from the body, different paragraphs of the message body as well as the message body from the commit message footers.
In Loose mode, multiple consecutive blank lines are treated the same as a single blank line.
The following commit message is valid in Loose mode but invalid in Strict mode:
feat: New Feature
Description of the feature
Second paragraph of the message body
Reviewed-By: someone@example.com
Closes #123Commit messages may contain one or more commit message footers. In Loose mode, one or more blank lines may appear between the individual footer while it is invalid in Strict mode.
The following commit message is valid in Loose mode but invalid in Strict mode:
feat: New Feature
Description of the feature.
Some more description.
Reviewed-By: someone@example.com
Closes #123In Loose mode, blank lines that only contain whitespace characters are treated as blank lines.
In Strict mode, a blank line my only contain a line-break (\r\n or \n).
The following commit message is valid in Loose mode but invalid in Strict mode (there is whitespace in the second line of the commit message):
feat: New Feature
Description of the feature