Document monthly release tooling available to engineers in a single location

Context

gitlab-com/gl-infra/software-delivery&1 (closed) proposes to move the active stable branch generation one week earlier in the release schedule to allow for thorough testing and timely backports. This will increase the quality, safety, and reliability of the monthly release while enabling a better developer experience and confidence.

Problem

Multiple tooling is available to review if a merge request is included in the monthly release:

However, it is challenging for engineers to determine if a code change was included in the monthly release. One of the reasons is that the above tooling is documented in different places throughout the handbook and the release/docs repository. This suboptimal experience makes it difficult for engineers to find the documentation.

Proposal: Document the available tooling in a single location

The release handbook includes a section on "How to determine if my merge request will make it into the monthly release" on how to verify if a code change will be included in the monthly release. This section should be expanded to:

  • List all the tooling available: Labels on the merge requests, merge request widget, ChatOps Command and the Release dashboard
  • Update the monthly release dashboard documentation to reflect the latest changes.
Edited by Mayra Cabrera