[Development] ChangeLog updated for 5.2.0

[Marc Mutz]

On Monday, November 25, 2013 12:20:05 PM Joerg Bornemann wrote:
> On 25.11.2013 10:53, Marc Mutz wrote:
> >> There were exactly 31 commits with [ChangeLog]. Please start using it
> >> more.
> > 
> > Samuel Gaist (thanks) suggested in PM to add a check to the sanity bot.
> 
> How would the bot know whether a change is worth a changelog entry?

Reviewers would need to override it if it isn't. We can also have a 
[ChangeLog][none], although that would be childish, in my mind.

I have found that significantly more than 50% of commits that touched 
qtbase/src/widgets since v5.1.0 end up in the change log. It could be a 
comment unless a Task-number is also present, in which case the bot could -1 
the change.

As a general remark, the value of dist/changes-* has declined significantly 
since Qt 4 and esp. since Qt 3 times. I'm currently trying to hunt down 
authors of v5.1.0..release changes, and it's no fun (a big thanks to the 60% 
of authors (by changes) that responded to the first nag mail, btw).

Either we drop the changes- file, or we automate its creation (somewhat) and 
require most commits to contribute to it in some way or another. The current 
situation is very unsatisfying, without a clear format (past tense vs. present 
tense, e.g.) and leaves a truly significant amount of work for the maintainer. 
Work which not every maintainer is willing to do.

Linux uses the output of git log (--oneline) as the changelog, a perfect 
solution that however only works if commit messages are well-written and 
complete, which we're still far away from.

Thanks,
Marc

-- 
Marc Mutz <marc.mutz at kdab.com> | Senior Software Engineer
KDAB (Deutschland) GmbH & Co.KG, a KDAB Group Company
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