Summary: Releases and tags

The one-sentence definition

A release is a tagged commit + release notes + an announcement. All the ceremony reduces to these three things.

The essential commands

git tag -a vX.Y.Z -m "Release vX.Y.Z: description"    # create annotated tag
git tag                                                # list tags
git tag --sort=-v:refname                              # list, sorted version-aware
git show vX.Y.Z                                        # tag details
git push origin vX.Y.Z                                 # push one tag
git push origin --tags                                 # push all tags
git fetch --tags                                       # fetch tags from remote
git tag -d vX.Y.Z                                      # delete tag locally
git push origin --delete vX.Y.Z                        # delete tag on remote

Semantic versioning (semver)

MAJOR.MINOR.PATCH

• MAJOR: incompatible changes (breaking)
• MINOR: new features, backward-compatible
• PATCH: bug fixes, backward-compatible

Pre-release: vX.Y.Z-alpha.1, vX.Y.Z-beta.3, vX.Y.Z-rc.1.

Canonical release notes structure

# vX.Y.Z - YYYY-MM-DD

## Highlights
## Breaking changes
## New features
## Improvements
## Bug fixes
## Migration notes
## Contributors

Not every release needs every section. Patch releases might only have “Bug fixes.”

Releases across the four workflows

Workflow	How releases work
GitHub Flow	Tag specific main commits; deploys are continuous regardless
GitFlow	Cut release/* branch, QA, merge to main + develop, tag main
Trunk-based	Often automated; tag specific trunk commits, auto-generate notes
Forking	Maintainer is the release authority; internal workflow drives mechanics

Audience-driven release notes

• Users want what’s new, what’s fixed, what’s broken
• Operators want deploy expectations, migration steps
• Developers want API changes, deprecations
• Auditors want a complete record

What you carry into L11

You can tag, version, and release any project. L11 covers two more primitives, cherry-pick (move commits between branches) and stash (save in-progress work). Both are tools for advanced workflows.

Voice anchor

Git stores snapshots. Every other command is just navigating those snapshots.

A tag is an immutable label on a specific snapshot. A release is that snapshot’s human-readable explanation.