Release process

Dispatch a validation run

Full Release Validation is the release product-validation umbrella. Most work happens in child workflows so a failed box can be rerun without restarting the whole release. Run release preparation before freezing the Code SHA; it refreshes Control UI locale output when the background bot has not landed it yet, then enforces the same strict zero-fallback check used by release CI.

Linux (ubuntu) cross-OS fresh-install and upgrade lanes gate publication in the beta, stable, and full profiles. Windows and macOS cross-OS lanes run in parallel as advisory coverage: their pass/fail conclusions remain in the manifest and summary, but failures do not block Release Decision, npm publish, or pnpm release:candidate. Selected lanes still need terminal evidence. Normal CI, npm qualification, Docker, Package Acceptance, and the profile's performance and soak requirements keep their existing gates.

Prepare the complete history manifest and substantive version-matched release notes before freezing the product-complete commit and its target context as the Code SHA/ref. Package source preflight requires a matching release section; an empty placeholder is not preparation. If the notes are final, this commit can also be the Release SHA. Select one trusted workflow commit and context as the Tooling SHA/ref, then run:

bash
TOOLING_SHA="<recorded-full-main-ancestor-sha>"pnpm ci:full-release \  --sha <code-sha> \  --target-ref release/YYYY.M.PATCH \  --workflow-sha "$TOOLING_SHA"

Record the candidate SHA/ref and Tooling SHA/ref once for the release and reuse them for later Code-SHA, Release-SHA, and focused reruns. Main lineage authorizes the initial Tooling SHA selection; it does not authorize refreshing the tooling from moving main.

Retain and reconcile the root request

Before creating remote refs, the helper writes a private operator artifact at .artifacts/full-release-validation/<request-id>.json and prints its path. Use --request-file <path> to choose the artifact location. It retains the repository, workflow, frozen target/tooling identities, transport refs, complete typed/defaulted inputs, effective soak, and the first observed run and attempt. The helper records attempted intent before its single workflow dispatch POST.

After a lost response or interruption, reuse that exact artifact:

bash
node scripts/full-release-validation-at-sha.mjs \  --reconcile-request .artifacts/full-release-validation/<request-id>.json

An existing --request-file also enters read-only reconciliation; conflicting target, tooling, or input arguments are rejected. Recovery performs no ref creation/deletion, dispatch, rerun, cancellation, Git fetch, or request rewrite. dispatch=observed reports the exact run URL and attempt, not successful validation. A newer attempt cannot replace the retained attempt.

Missing or ambiguous runs, incomplete pagination, unavailable or mismatched input witnesses, and exhausted discovery remain dispatch=unknown. A complete HTTP rejection is retained as dispatch=rejected; neither state permits redispatch. Keep the artifact and printed refs for investigation. There is no automatic retention expiry or cleanup for the local artifact; remove it only through deliberate operator cleanup. Losing or deleting it never proves non-execution. Independent requests and copies on other hosts are not globally deduplicated.

New requests require FULL_RELEASE_DISPATCH_WITNESS_CONTRACT=1 in the pinned workflow. Older frozen tooling fails before remote creation instead of starting work whose inputs cannot be proven. The helper never upgrades the Tooling SHA. Use frv status for already-running frozen validations; choosing different tooling for a new validation requires the release owner's explicit decision. The workflow's separate input witness is attempt-bound and retained for seven days. It reads the event file directly, without interpolating inputs into step environment variables or logs. Only safe GitHub context and a SHA-256 digest are uploaded: input keys sorted lexicographically, primitive values normalized to wire strings, then JSON serialization. The immutable workflow SHA binds the input types; the complete typed and wire maps remain in the private local artifact. Runner or artifact-service failure can leave the witness unavailable; it is never a release receipt or publication authority.

Select coverage

provider also accepts anthropic or minimax for cross-OS onboarding and the end-to-end agent turn. Regular release/* targets accept the branch's final package version or a matching beta prerelease. For a correction, use --target-ref release/YYYY.M.PATCH-N to preserve the intended final tag before tagging. Its base package version is also accepted when vYYYY.M.PATCH resolves to the exact Code SHA; preparation retains the package version and seals both npm and Docker artifacts for vYYYY.M.PATCH-N. Tideclaw alpha validation uses its exact alpha tag and matching alpha branch. The helper maps beta releases and exact alpha tags to the beta profile and final versions to stable. Pass alternate workflow inputs with -f key=value; use -f release_profile=full only for the broad advisory sweep. fail_fast defaults to false, so dispatched child workflows finish and expose independent failures together. In that mode, the parent makes no child cancellation calls. Pass -f fail_fast=true only when the shorter first-failure path is preferable; Release Decision then cancels only the exact still-active child that owns the blocking failure. Same-parent continuation requires the original root to have been dispatched with fail_fast=false. The controller verifies that exact logged input before any rerun mutation. Current runs dispatch standalone Full Release Artifacts producers for npm, Docker, and the validation candidate. Each producer owns its immutable dispatch record and output receipt. Parent retries recover those exact producer IDs and attempts, recheck their source and Tooling SHAs, and reuse the successful builds. Historical parents that produced their own candidate or publication artifacts cannot continue: keep both SHAs frozen and start a fresh all-group validation.

After dispatch, the parent writes one immutable full-release-execution-plan-<run-id> artifact and preserves the same bytes in an exact run-ID Actions cache. It records selected and required coverage, gate results, reuse identity, the original parent attempt, the fresh candidate request plus producer and publisher evidence when preparation ran, and every exact child run ID, attempt, title, workflow ref, and Tooling SHA. Decision, Drain, manifest generation, evidence verification, and the final verifier consume the artifact for their current attempt. Collector retries use the exact run-ID cache as an acceleration. If that cache is unavailable, they restore the same immutable plan from the parent-run artifact, validate it, and upload the artifact again for the retry; they never rebuild the plan or redispatch tests. A missing or invalid artifact fails closed, so start a new validation instead of retrying that stale parent. Release Decision also repeats canonical reuse-chain validation before a reused run can pass. The sealed target SHA, evidence SHA, policy, changed-path set, selected run, root run, source manifest, trusted tooling identity, and child tuple must all still match.

On a parent retry, final verification selects the newest available Release Decision and Diagnostic Drain artifacts independently. Both must bind the same immutable plan and exact child tuple; their source attempts remain recorded in the artifacts and may differ when only one collector needed a retry.

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