ReleaseEngineering/How To/Create new ESR branch
This process also works, with slight (obvious?) modifications for new twigs and b2g gecko branches. ESR17 process was tracked by bug 796995 and the dependent bugs. For ESR 24 is was bug 913195 for Firefox, and bug 913197 for Thunderbird. The process can be split into 2 major parts: internal and external
Internal changes
This covers changes to configs, buildbotcustom and tools.
buildbotcustom changes for ESR17 were not critical and are not ESR specific.
See bug 1237094 and bug 1135702 for the details and examples
buildbot-configs changes
Some highlights:
- Explicitly list the platforms (and use lock_platforms) since we don't ship ESR to all mozilla-central/release platforms (android, for example)
- Copy mozilla-beta configs, compare them to the previous ESR release and check if you understand what they stand for
- check mozilla-beta exceptions (loops) and check if they are aplicable to the current ESR
- for every exception (MERGE DAY exceptions) file a bug to track it
- you may need to add shortening code for new branches
- make sure to run test-masters.sh to verify
- see, e.g. https://hg.mozilla.org/build/buildbotcustom/annotate/b863ef3d9559/common.py#l128
tools changes
- adds new branch to buildapi's production-branches.json file
- mozconfig whitelist changes (tested in bug 808077)
- since the config patch introduces new configuration file(s) which are needed to be symlinked on the build/scheduler masters there is a need for a fabric methods to create the links
- adds new release branch to production-masters.json file
It's important that the buildbot-configs changes are landed and in production prior to adding the symlinks and adjusting production-masters.json. When you land these two changes you must immediately run the fabric method to put the symlinks in place to ensure the masters will continue to function correctly.
External changes
Ask Developer Services to clone repos
See bug 807979 for the details, but now filed to "Developer Services::Merurial: hg.mozilla.org". We usually clone ~1-2 weeks in advance off beta to test how automation works.
Separately, ask Developer Services to add the new gecko esr branch to the unified gecko repository "gecko-dev". See bug 1164217 for details.
Add new branches to treestatus.m.o
Ask a treestatus admin to add the trees, or file a bug in Webtools::Tree Status. Notice that Thunderbird trees have -thunderbird suffix (comm-esr17-thunderbird). (as of bug 823618, tree addition & deletion require admin rights. Current admins include sheriffs, catlee, hwine. See bug 877948 for futures.)
Update tree closure hooks
See bug 807983 for the details (fyi, ted has given us blanket approval to land branch-name-only updates - have someone else double check). Requires deployment by IT (see bug 807694).
Update Treeherder
- File P1 bug against Treeherder to support the new repository. Ping in #treeherder if urgent.
- Note that data for unknown repositories is ignored by Treeherder. Nothing breaks, but no data will be available.
Update Socorro
File a Socorro bug to have them add support for the new ESR branch (and its comm-esrNN equivalent).
Pull from mozilla-release
Once mozilla-release is merged from mozilla-beta you can run the script which pulls last changes from mozilla-release, updates some configs and replaces some branding bits.
Running gecko_migration.py for mozilla-esr
EDIT configs/merge_day/release_to_esr.py and update ESR versions.
Example invocation:
# clone mozharness hg clone http://hg.mozilla.org/build/mozharness python mozharness/scripts/merge_day/gecko_migration.py -c mozharness/configs/merge_day/release_to_esr.py
- the script will tag mozilla-release
- it will continue by pulling mozilla-release to mozilla-esrNN, adjusting branding and changing some configs.
- Once the script finishes, run an hg diff to see the uncommitted changes that the script generated:
(cd build/mozilla-esrNN; hg diff) | more # an |hg out| will show the migrated changesets; an |hg out --patch| will show the patches for the migrated changesets.
- It's best to get a visual review by someone else as well.
- Commit+push the final bits by
# Make sure you already pushed your release version bump and reconfiged before this part! python mozharness/scripts/merge_day/gecko_migration.py -c mozharness/configs/merge_day/release_to_esr.py --commit-changes --push
- The push should be available at https://tbpl.mozilla.org/?tree=Mozilla-EsrNN
In case of failure, you can start again from the top; no need to clobber (the on-by-default clean-repos action will be sufficient). It should be faster the second time, since you won't be pulling in as many changesets from hg.m.o.
Testing
CI builds
Make sure to run all esr and some other builds in staging. Run leak test and nightly builds 2 times to allow them to generate leak log and partial updates.
Release builds
Make sure to run a staging release. It takes less time then usual build, because there are no updates to be generated.
Ship it!
Close the bug and have some tea. :)