GitLab 9.3 release post

Review Apps link: https://release-9-3.about.gitlab.com/2017/06/22/gitlab-9-3-released/

Release Post

• Blog handbook: https://about.gitlab.com/handbook/marketing/blog/
• Release post handbook: https://about.gitlab.com/handbook/marketing/blog/release-posts/

General Contributions

General contributions from the team.

Due date: 06/14 (6th working day before the 22nd)

• Label MR: blog post release
• Add milestone
• Intro
• MVP
• Add cover image image_title (compressed)
• Upgrade barometer
• Top features
• Primary features
• Secondary features (improvements)
• Performance improvements
• Omnibus improvements
• Deprecations
• Documentation links
• Authorship (author's data)

Review

Content review (PMs)

Due date: 06/19 (2nd working day before the 22nd)

• Label MR: blog post release review-in-progress
• General review (PM)
  • Check Features' names
  • Check Features' availability (CE, EES, EEP)
  • Check Documentation links
  • Update data/promo.yml
  • Check all images' size - compress whenever > 300KB
  • Meaningful links (SEO)
  • Check links to product/feature webpages
• Copyedit (Sean P, Rebecca, or Marcia)
  • Title
  • Description
  • Grammar, spelling, clearness (body)
• Final review (Job)

Structural Check

Due date: 06/19 (2nd working day before the 22nd)

• Label MR: blog post release review-structure
• Check frontmatter (entries, syntax)
• Check image_title and twitter_image
• Check image shadow {:.shadow}
• Check images' ALT text
• Videos/iframes wrapped in <figure> tags (responsiveness)
• Add/check <!-- more --> separator
• Add/check cover img reference (at the end of the post)
• Columns (content balance between the columns)
• Badges consistency (applied to all headings)
• Remove any remaining instructions
• Remove HTML comments
• Run deadlink checker
• Update release template with any changes (if necessary)

source/posts/2017-06-22-gitlab-9-3-released.html.md

@@ -14,12 +14,12 @@ categories: release
 #  - release-posts.js
 ---
-<!-- 
+<!--
 - Add the content here. _Ad hoc_ free until the 6th working day before the 22nd. After that, we'll freeze the post.
 - Content review: will take place during the 5th and the 4th working day before the 22nd.
 - Styles will be applied in the 3rd to 1st working day before the 22nd. How to apply styles: check the [handbook](/handbook/marketing/blog/relese-post/).
-**Use the merge request template "Release-Post", and please set the calendar date for each stage.** 
+**Use the merge request template "Release-Post", and please set the calendar date for each stage.**
 Uncomment the section you fill in. -->
@@ -64,6 +64,14 @@ Enter the introduction here -->
 Describe it as a feature. -->
+## Performance improvements
+
+We are continuing to make great strides improving the performance of GitLab in every release. Not only will this make individual instances of GitLab even faster, but will also greatly improve the performance of GitLab.com, an instance that has over 1 million users!
+
+In GitLab 9.3 we are continuing to make listing projects a lot faster and improving performance overall server performance by making changes to how we mirror repositories. Syntax highlighting on files will also be cached to improve overall performance and make viewing commits noticeably faster.
+
+There are [numerous other performance enhancements](https://gitlab.com/groups/gitlab-org/issues?scope=all&state=opened&utf8=%E2%9C%93&milestone_title=9.3&label_name%5B%5D=performance) in GitLab 9.3 that should not only make GitLab feel faster, but reduce overall impact on server infrastructure. 
+
 <!-- ## Omnibus improvements
 - Describe all improvements here. Link to docs, issues, and MRs whenever applicable. -->
@@ -161,7 +169,7 @@ Will remove this line in blog post: https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ee/issu
 <!-- - Feature name: Report abusive content
 - Available in: CE
 - Feature weight: main
-- Documentation link: 
+- Documentation link:
 - Feature description, related images, and videos: -->
 We believe that everyone should contribute. To enable that, GitLab needs to be a safe platform where people can effectively collaborate. This new feature allows users to easily report abusive content the moment they see it, in issues or merge requests. By lowering this friction, it the community to more quickly report malicious users to admins, who can take swift action.
@@ -175,7 +183,7 @@ Will remove this line in blog post: https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issu
 <!-- - Feature name: (Native) group milestones
 - Available in: CE
 - Feature weight: main
-- Documentation link: 
+- Documentation link:
 - Feature description, related images, and videos: -->
 With this release, GitLab is introducing truly native support for group milestones. In the past, group milestones were actually project milestones in the background, which made sense when GitLab was mainly a project-focused collaboration platform. As we move toward solving team-focused problems, GitLab groups are becoming increasingly important, especially with our recent release of subgroups. So in this release, we are bringing native group milestones. An issue can now be assigned to either a project milestone or a group milestone. And so you can now easily see issues across multiple projects in a single milestone.
@@ -189,7 +197,7 @@ Will remove this line in blog post: https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issu
 <!-- - Feature name: Confidential issues re-design
 - Available in: CE
 - Feature weight: secondary
-- Documentation link: 
+- Documentation link:
 - Feature description, related images, and videos: -->
 We tweaked the design of confidential issues in this release, making it more obvious when you are participating in one. This is especially helpful with the Service Desk feature recently released, so that you can easily see that you are responding to an external customer / user.
@@ -203,7 +211,7 @@ Will remove this line in blog post: https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issu
 <!-- - Feature name: Conversational Development Index
 - Available in: CE
 - Feature weight: main
-- Documentation link: 
+- Documentation link:
 - Feature description, related images, and videos: -->
 For on-prem users, if you activate the usage ping in your instance, you can now see the conversational development index of your instance.
@@ -217,7 +225,7 @@ Will remove this line in blog post: https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issu
 <!-- - Feature name: Continued Auto Updates in GitLab
 - Available in: CE
 - Feature weight: secondary
-- Documentation link: 
+- Documentation link:
 - Feature description, related images, and videos: -->
 With each release, GitLab increasingly updates itself automatically, so that you no longer need to refresh a particular page. In this release, the title and description of merge requests automatically updates. This already happens in issues, as introduced in recent releases.
@@ -229,7 +237,7 @@ With each release, GitLab increasingly updates itself automatically, so that you
 <!-- - Feature name: Inline issue description update
 - Available in: CE
 - Feature weight: secondary
-- Documentation link: 
+- Documentation link:
 - Feature description, related images, and videos: -->
 The issue description serves as the single source of truth when teams collaborate on work and ideas are rapidly flowing in the issue comment thread. With this release, it's much easier to update the description by simply clicking the pencil icon. You do not have to go to a separate web form. Just make the update inline, and click save to persist the changes.
@@ -241,7 +249,7 @@ The issue description serves as the single source of truth when teams collaborat
 <!-- - Feature name: Bulk issue update improvements
 - Available in: CE
 - Feature weight: secondary
-- Documentation link: 
+- Documentation link:
 - Feature description, related images, and videos: -->
 We've made bulk updating issues even simpler and more intuitive in this latest release. We've leveraged the sidebar paradigm that already pervades GitLab. So users will feel right at home using a transient sidebar when updating multiple issues at once.
@@ -255,7 +263,7 @@ Will remove this line in blog post: https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issu
 <!-- - Feature name: Issue board todo / closed
 - Available in: CE
 - Feature weight: secondary
-- Documentation link: 
+- Documentation link:
 - Feature description, related images, and videos: -->
 We recongize that teams use issue boards in a variety of ways. To make it usable for even more teams, we now have a toggle-able to do and close columns.
@@ -269,7 +277,78 @@ Will remove this line in blog post: https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issu
 <!-- - Feature name: Single click to activate dropdown in search bar
 - Available in: CE
 - Feature weight: secondary
-- Documentation link: 
+- Documentation link:
 - Feature description, related images, and videos: -->
 Will remove this line in blog post: https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issues/31757
+
+----
+
+## Centralized Audit Log & Extended user audit actions
+
+<!-- - Feature name: Centralized Audit Log & Extended user audit actions
+- Available in: EE
+- Feature weight: primary
+- Documentation link:
+- Feature description, related images, and videos: -->
+
+Many companies have the need for audit and compliance across the entire development cycle. In GitLab 9.3 there is now a centralized Audit Log that includes all audit events from all Groups, Projects and user actions.
+
+Additionally in GitLab EE, existing user audit events - that were previously limited to just authentication events in GitLab CI - are expanded to include the following actions:
+ * Add a new email address
+ * Remove an email address
+ * Password change
+ * Forget password
+ * Failed to login
+ * Add SSH key
+ * Grant Oauth access
+
+Will remove these lines in blog post: https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ee/issues/2336
+https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ee/issues/1370
+
+----
+
+## Internationalization of Project Home & Repository File page
+
+<!-- - Feature name: Internationalization of Project Home & Repository File page
+- Available in: CE
+- Feature weight: secondary
+- Documentation link:
+- Feature description, related images, and videos: -->
+
+In GitLab 9.2 we started the process of [internationalization](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issues/4012) with the Cycle Analytics page in German and Spanish. In GitLab 9.3 we are extending this to more frequently used pages such as the Project Home and Repository Files pages.
+
+We will also be producing additional documentation and contributor guidelines on how to help us fully internationalize GitLab as part of this effort so that the community can help make the GitLab available in many languages.
+
+Will remove this line in blog post: https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issues/31499
+
+----
+
+## Settings made simple
+
+<!-- - Feature name: Settings made simple
+- Available in: CE
+- Feature weight: primary
+- Documentation link:
+- Feature description, related images, and videos: -->
+
+Over time, the number of settings in GitLab has expanded as we've extended functionality and configuration options for projects and groups.
+
+In GitLab 9.3 we will [start to simplify the settings pages](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issues/28451) by making the [Repository Settings](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issues/30378) page a lot more readable.
+
+Settings will be better grouped and allow people to see an overview of all the settings available for a certain section.
+
+----
+
+## Improvements to sub groups
+<!-- - Feature name: Improvements to sub groups
+- Available in: CE
+- Feature weight: secondary
+- Documentation link:
+- Feature description, related images, and videos: -->
+
+In GitLab 9.0 we introduced sub groups, allowing for more flexibility and management of groups and projects.
+
+We are continuing to improve this functionality in ever release and in GitLab 9.3 we are making the discoverability and navigation of subgroups a lot better. On the Groups page you can now see an expandable tree view of all subgroups and projects rather than having to navigate and explore them one page load at a time.
+
+Will remove this line in blog post: https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issues/30343