Release and maintenance
=======================

.. contents:: Topics
   :local:

.. _schedule:

Release cycle
`````````````

Ansible is developed and released on a flexible 4 months release cycle.
This cycle can be extended in order to allow for larger changes to be properly
implemented and tested before a new release is made available.

Ansible supports the two most recent major stable releases.
For more information, read about the
`development and stable version maintenance workflow`_.

If you are using a release of Ansible that is no longer supported, we strongly
encourage you to upgrade as soon as possible in order to benefit from the
latest features and security fixes.

Older unsupported versions of Ansible can contain unfixed security
vulnerabilities (*CVE*).

You can refer to the `porting guide`_ for tips on updating your Ansible
playbooks to run on newer versions.

.. _porting guide: https://docs.ansible.com/ansible/porting_guide_2.0.html

Release status
``````````````

+-----------------+----------------------------+----------------------------------------+
| Ansible release | Latest version             | Status                                 |
+=================+============================+========================================+
| devel           | `2.4`_ (unreleased, trunk) | In development                         |
+-----------------+----------------------------+----------------------------------------+
| 2.3             | `2.3.2`_ (2017-08-08)      | Supported (bug **and** security fixes) |
+-----------------+----------------------------+----------------------------------------+
| 2.2             | `2.2.3`_ (2017-05-09)      | Supported (**only** security fixes)    |
+-----------------+----------------------------+----------------------------------------+
| 2.1             | `2.1.6`_ (2017-06-01)      | Unsupported (end of life)              |
+-----------------+----------------------------+----------------------------------------+
| 2.0             | `2.0.2`_ (2016-04-19)      | Unsupported (end of life)              |
+-----------------+----------------------------+----------------------------------------+
| 1.9             | `1.9.6`_ (2016-04-15)      | Unsupported (end of life)              |
+-----------------+----------------------------+----------------------------------------+
| <1.9            | n/a                        | Unsupported (end of life)              |
+-----------------+----------------------------+----------------------------------------+

.. _2.4: https://github.com/ansible/ansible/blob/devel/CHANGELOG.md
.. _2.3.2: https://github.com/ansible/ansible/blob/stable-2.3/CHANGELOG.md
.. _2.2.3: https://github.com/ansible/ansible/blob/stable-2.2/CHANGELOG.md
.. _2.1.6: https://github.com/ansible/ansible/blob/stable-2.1/CHANGELOG.md
.. _2.0.2: https://github.com/ansible/ansible/blob/stable-2.0/CHANGELOG.md
.. _1.9.6: https://github.com/ansible/ansible/blob/stable-1.9/CHANGELOG.md

.. _support_life:
.. _methods:

Development and stable version maintenance workflow
```````````````````````````````````````````````````

The Ansible community develops and maintains Ansible on GitHub_.

New modules, plugins, features and bugfixes will always be integrated in what
will become the next major version of Ansible.
This work is tracked on the ``devel`` git branch.

Ansible provides bugfixes and security improvements for the most recent major
release while the previous major release will only receive security patches.
This work is tracked on the ``stable-<version>`` git branches.

The fixes that land in supported stable branches will eventually be released
as a new version when necessary.

For more information on the changes included in each new version, you can refer
to the changelog_, available on GitHub.

Note that while there are no guarantees for providing fixes for unsupported
releases of Ansible, there can sometimes be exceptions for critical issues.

.. _GitHub: https://github.com/ansible/ansible
.. _changelog: https://github.com/ansible/ansible/blob/devel/CHANGELOG.md

Release candidates
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Before a new release or version of Ansible can be done, it will typically go
through a release candidate process.

This provides the Ansible community the opportunity to test Ansible and report
bugs or issues they might come across.

Ansible tags the first release candidate (``RC1``) which is usually scheduled
to last five business days. The final release is done if no major bugs or
issues are identified during this period.

If there are major problems with the first candidate, a second candidate will
be tagged (``RC2``) once the necessary fixes have landed.
This second candidate lasts for a shorter duration than the first.
If no problems have been reported after two business days, the final release is
done.

More release candidates can be tagged as required, so long as there are
bugs that the Ansible core maintainers consider should be fixed before the
final release.

.. _freezing:

Feature freeze
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

While there is a pending release candidate, the focus of core developers and
maintainers will on fixes towards the release candidate.

Merging new features or fixes that are not related to the release candidate may
be delayed in order to allow the new release to be shipped as soon as possible.

.. seealso::

   :doc:`committer_guidelines`
       Guidelines for Ansible core contributors and maintainers
   :doc:`test_strategies`
       Testing strategies
   :doc:`community`
       Community information and contributing
   `Ansible Changelog <https://github.com/ansible/ansible/blob/devel/CHANGELOG.md>`_
       Documentation of the improvements for each version of Ansible
   `Ansible release tarballs <https://releases.ansible.com/ansible/>`_
       Ansible release tarballs
   `Development Mailing List <http://groups.google.com/group/ansible-devel>`_
       Mailing list for development topics
   `irc.freenode.net <http://irc.freenode.net>`_
       #ansible IRC chat channel
