[p4] Implementing mainline model with build promotion

[Chuck Karish]

On 6/26/07, Stephen Nesbitt <snesbitt at cobaltgroup.com> wrote:

> My question is on what branch should the QA build occur? on the [july
> release branch] or on [main]? Or - to say it another way - does the
> promotion from the july effort to main occur before or after the build.

One policy that works is to synchronize the release branch with main
when the features for July are code complete and then integrate
only bug-fix changes to stabilize the release.  The promotion to
"releasable" comes after QA approves a build.

> My gut tells me to perform the QA build on the [july release]. Once QA has
> accepted that build the promotion occurs (using the changelist on which
> the QA build was based). This is a copy merge and - theoretically - main
> should be identical to the july effort at the time of the QA build
> changelist.

In order to obey this constraint main would have to be frozen except
for bug fixes during the stabilization phase.  I integrate from main to
release at a changelist at which the continuous build is clean and
passes unit tests.  The only reason for a code freeze is that the
continuous build is broken.

-- 
Chuck Karish   karish at well.com   (415) 317-0182