ci: add create release wf

.github/scripts/create-release.sh

@@ -0,0 +1,58 @@
+#!/usr/bin/env bash
+#
+# Copyright 2025 The Dapr Authors
+# Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
+# you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
+# You may obtain a copy of the License at
+#     http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
+# Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
+# distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
+# WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
+# See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
+# limitations under the License.
+
+set -ue
+
+# Thanks to https://ihateregex.io/expr/semver/
+SEMVER_REGEX='^(0|[1-9]\d*)\.(0|[1-9]\d*)\.(0|[1-9]\d*)(?:-((?:0|[1-9]\d*|\d*[a-zA-Z-][0-9a-zA-Z-]*)(?:\.(?:0|[1-9]\d*|\d*[a-zA-Z-][0-9a-zA-Z-]*))*))?(?:\+([0-9a-zA-Z-]+(?:\.[0-9a-zA-Z-]+)*))?$'
+
+REL_VERSION=`echo $1 | sed -r 's/^[vV]?([0-9].+)$/\1/'`
+
+if [ `echo $REL_VERSION | pcre2grep "$SEMVER_REGEX"` ]; then
+  echo "$REL_VERSION is a valid semantic version."
+else
+  echo "$REL_VERSION is not a valid semantic version."
+  exit 1
+fi
+
+MAJOR_MINOR_VERSION=`echo $REL_VERSION | cut -d. -f1,2`
+RELEASE_BRANCH="release-$MAJOR_MINOR_VERSION"
+RELEASE_TAG="v$REL_VERSION"
+SUFFIX=`echo $REL_VERSION | grep \- | cut -d- -f2 | cut -d. -f1`
+if [ "$SUFFIX" == "alpha" ]; then
+  # Alpha releases come from the master branch as they are not complete for an RC yet.
+  RELEASE_BRANCH="master"
+fi
+
+if [ `git rev-parse --verify origin/$RELEASE_BRANCH 2>/dev/null` ]; then
+  echo "$RELEASE_BRANCH branch already exists, checking it out ..."
+  git checkout $RELEASE_BRANCH
+else
+  echo "$RELEASE_BRANCH does not exist, creating ..."
+  git checkout -b $RELEASE_BRANCH
+  git push origin $RELEASE_BRANCH
+fi
+echo "$RELEASE_BRANCH branch is ready."
+
+if [ `git rev-parse --verify $RELEASE_TAG 2>/dev/null` ]; then
+  echo "$RELEASE_TAG tag already exists, aborting ..."
+  exit 2
+fi
+
+echo "Tagging $RELEASE_TAG ..."
+git tag $RELEASE_TAG
+echo "$RELEASE_TAG is tagged."
+
+echo "Pushing $RELEASE_TAG tag ..."
+git push origin $RELEASE_TAG
+echo "$RELEASE_TAG tag is pushed."

.github/workflows/create-release.yaml

@@ -0,0 +1,49 @@
+#
+# Copyright 2025 The Dapr Authors
+# Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
+# you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
+# You may obtain a copy of the License at
+#     http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
+# Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
+# distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
+# WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
+# See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
+# limitations under the License.
+#
+
+name: Create a release
+
+on:
+  workflow_dispatch:
+    inputs:
+      rel_version:
+        description: 'Release version (examples: 1.16.0-rc.1, 1.16.0)'
+        required: true 
+        type: string
+
+permissions: {}
+
+jobs:
+  create-release:
+    name: Creates release branch and tag
+    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
+    permissions:
+      contents: write
+    steps:
+      - name: Check out code
+        uses: actions/checkout@v4
+        with:
+          fetch-depth: 0
+      - name: Install required packages
+        run: |
+          sudo apt-get update
+          sudo apt-get install pcre2-utils
+      - name: Create release branch and tag
+        env:
+          GITHUB_TOKEN: ${{ secrets.DAPR_BOT_TOKEN }}
+        run: |
+          git config user.email "daprweb@diagrid.io"
+          git config user.name "Dapr Bot"
+          # Update origin with token
+          git remote set-url origin https://x-access-token:${GITHUB_TOKEN}@github.com/${GITHUB_REPOSITORY}.git
+          ./.github/scripts/create-release.sh ${{ inputs.rel_version }}

docs/development/release.md

@@ -9,7 +9,10 @@ Only the repository maintainers and release team are allowed to execute the belo
 
 ## Pre-release build
 
+### Dapr CLI manual release process
+
 Pre-release build will be built from `release-<major>.<minor>` branch and versioned by git version tag suffix e.g. `-rc.0`, `-rc.1`, etc. This build is not released to users who use the latest stable version.
+
 **Pre-release process**
 1. Create a PR to update the `Dapr runtime` and `Dapr dashboard` pre-release versions in workflow and tests files wherever applicable, and merge the PR to master branch. For example, please take a look at this PR - https://github.com/dapr/cli/pull/1019. Please note that this PR is just for reference and only reflects the absolute minimum number of file changes. These versions update could lead to some other changes also.
 
@@ -33,6 +36,12 @@ $ git push upstream v1.11.0-rc.0
 7. Create new pre-release version tag (with suffix -rc.1, -rc.2, etc).
 8. Repeat from 5 to 7 until all bugs are fixed.
 
+### Dapr CLI automated release process
+
+The Dapr CLI automated release process is triggered by the `create-release` workflow. This workflow is triggered by the `create-release` button in the GitHub Actions UI.
+
+This workflow will create a new release branch and tag, and trigger the Dapr CLI build.
+
 
 ## Release the stable version to users
 
@@ -43,3 +52,7 @@ Once all bugs are fixed, stable version can be released. Create a new git versio
 ## Release Patch version
 
 Work on the existing `release-<major>.<minor>` branch to release a patch version. Once all bugs are fixed, create a new patch version tag, such as `v1.11.1-rc.0`. After verifying the fixes on this pre-release, create a new git version tag such as `v1.11.1` and push the tag. CI will create the new build artifacts and release them.
+
+## Project Release Guidelines
+
+See [this document](https://github.com/dapr/community/blob/master/release-process.md) for the project's release process and guidelines.