Release post - GitLab 9.5

Review Apps link: https://release-9-5.about.gitlab.com/2017/08/22/gitlab-9-5-released/

• Data file (main content): https://gitlab.com/gitlab-com/www-gitlab-com/blob/release-9-5/data/release_posts/2017_08_22_gitlab_9_5_released.yml
• Blog post file (intro) link: https://gitlab.com/gitlab-com/www-gitlab-com/blob/release-9-5/source/posts/2017-08-22-gitlab-9-5-released.html.md
• Release 9.5 issue: https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ce/issues/36157

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: 13/08 (6th working day before the 22nd)

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

Features

PMs: please check your box only when all your features and deprecations were added with completion (documentation links, images, etc). Pls don't check your item if there are still things missing.

• Fabio - CI/CD
• Victor - Discussion
• Mark - I2P
• Mike - Platform
• Joshua- Monitoring
• Stan - Geo
• Job - Edge

Tip: make your own checklist:

• Primary features
• Improvements (secondary features)
• Deprecations
• Documentation links
• Illustrations
• Update features.yml

Review

Ideally, complete the review until the 4th working day before the 22nd, so that the 3rd and the 2nd working day before the release could be left for fixes and small improvements.

Content review (PMs)

Due date: 18/08 (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)
• Marketing review (PMM, CMM)
• Final review (Job)

Structural Check

Due date: 18/08 (2nd working day before the 22nd)

• 1. Structural check
• 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)
• Check if all docs link to EE
• Remove any remaining instructions
• Remove HTML comments
• Run deadlink checker
• Update release template with any changes (if necessary)