Changelog Meta Processing

Monteur has a special metadata processing function for sourcing and processing changelog entry. The inner mechanics are explained here!

The Problems

It was all started when performing a packaging with Package Meta Processing where each package has its own version and format of changelog output files.

Generally speaking, it was very messy to generate different set of changelog based on the packager type and requirements. Some packages, like .deb type, has platform specific in its changelog and essentially made the generation efforts even more complicated at scale; some like .appimage does not need a changelog at all.

Another issue is that there are various version control system like git, svn, and etc. Hence, this complicates the process of sourcing the latest changelog entry and trying to simplify all of them into a single maintainable yet simple CI Job recipe.

The Solution

To solve the problems above, Monteur uses this Changelog Meta Processing approach to facilitate changelog sourcing and output formatting as a preprocessor. This approach works closely with Package Meta Processing function.

The idea is to:

1. Provides a 2-stage Commands Execution Unit (CEU) commands execution where:

   1. The 1ST stage source and process the changelog data; AND

   2. The 2ND stage actually runs the recipe's actual CEU commands.

2. Matchmaking closely with Package Meta Processing function to ensure the changelog data and filepath are always aligned.

Available Formats

Montuer facilitates a list of built-in changelog formats for updating the changelog files seamlessly. To select the format, you set it via Metadata.Type field. For example:

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[Metadata]
...
Type = 'deb'

• manual

  1. You will do it manually via ChangelogEntries variable in the recipe CEU commands.

  2. Available since Montuer version v0.0.2.

• markdown

  1. Prepend changelog entires into a markdown format file.

  2. The highest heading level is level 2 (h2).

  3. Available since Montuer version v0.0.2.

• deb

  1. Prepend changelog entires into a .deb package changelog file.

  2. Platform-specific data is required and shall be supplied via the package meta processing data structure.

  3. Available since Montuer version v0.0.2.

• txt

  1. Prepend changelog entires into a native text file.

  2. Available since Montuer version v0.0.2.

Data Structure

To operate this function, Monteur uses a single unified changelog data structure alongside Package Meta Processing data structure. Hence, there are 2 parts of it so the following sub-sections shall detail them from top to bottom in sequences.

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...

[Changelog]
LineBreak = "\n"
Regex = ''

[[Changelog.CMD]]
Name = "Fetch All Local Remote Branches To The Latest"
Type = 'command'
Condition = [ 'all-all' ]
Source = 'git fetch --all'

[[Changelog.CMD]]
Name = "Get Changelog Data from Git Log Between Branches"
Type = 'command'
Condition = [ 'all-all' ]
Source = """git --no-pager log \
"{{- .ChangelogTo -}}..{{- .ChangelogFrom -}}" \
--pretty="format:%h %s"
"""
Save = "ChangelogEntries"

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...

[Packages.linux-amd64]
OS = [ 'linux' ]
Arch = [ 'amd64' ]
Distribution = [
        'stable',
]
Changelog = '{{- .DataDir -}}/debian/changelog-{{- .PkgArch -}}'

[Packages.linux-arm64]
OS = [ 'linux' ]
Arch = [ 'arm64' ]
Distribution = [
        'stable',
]
Changelog = '{{- .DataDir -}}/debian/changelog-{{- .PkgArch -}}'

[Packages.linux-armhf]
OS = [ 'linux' ]
Arch = [ 'armhf' ]
Distribution = [
        'stable',
]
Changelog = '{{- .DataDir -}}/debian/changelog-{{- .PkgArch -}}'

...