Tasks for v1.4 release cycle

[sbueringer]

Please see the corresponding section in release-tasks.md for documentation of individual tasks.

Tasks

Notes:

• Weeks are only specified to give some orientation.
• The following is based on the v1.4 release cycle. Modify according to the tracked release cycle.

Week -3 to 1:

• [Release Lead] Set a tentative release date for the minor release
• [Release Lead] Assemble release team

Week 1:

• [Release Lead] Finalize release schedule and team
• [Release Lead] Prepare main branch for development of the new release
• [Communications Manager] Add docs to collect release notes for users and migration notes for provider implementers
• [Communications Manager] Update supported versions

Week 1 to 4:

• [Release Lead] [Track] Remove previously deprecated code

Week 6:

• [Release Lead] Cut the v1.3.1 release

Week 9:

• [Release Lead] Cut the v1.3.2 release

Week 11 to 12:

• [Release Lead] [Track] Bump dependencies

Week 13:

• [Release Lead] Cut the v1.4.0-beta.0 release
• [Release Lead] Cut the v1.3.3 release
• [Release Lead] Create a new GitHub milestone for the next release

Week 14:

• [Release Lead] Cut the v1.4.0-beta.1 release
• [Release Lead] Select release lead for the next release cycle

Week 15:

• [Release Lead] Create the release-1.4 release branch
• [Release Lead] Cut the v1.4.0-rc.0 release
• [CI Manager] Setup jobs and dashboards for the release-1.4 release branch
• [Communications Manager] Ensure the book for the new release is available

Week 15 to 17:

• [Communications Manager] Polish release notes

Week 16:

• [Release Lead] Cut the v1.4.0-rc.1 release

Week 17:

• [Release Lead] Cut the v1.4.0 release
• [Release Lead] Cut the v1.3.4 release
• [Release Lead] Organize release retrospective
• [Communications Manager] Change production branch in Netlify to the new release branch
• [Communications Manager] Update clusterctl links in the quickstart

Continuously:

• [Release lead] Maintain the GitHub release milestone
• [Communications Manager] Communicate key dates to the community
• [Communications Manager] Improve release process documentation
• [Communications Manager] Maintain and improve user facing documentation about releases, release policy and release calendar
• [CI Manager] Monitor CI signal
• [CI Manager] Reduce the amount of flaky tests
• [CI Manager] Bug triage
• [CI Manager] Maintain and improve release automation, tooling & related developer docs

If and when necessary:

• [Release Lead] [Track] Bump the Cluster API apiVersion
• [Release Lead] [Track] Bump the Kubernetes version

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Test

link

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runner 🏃