Use gitattribute merge=union to reduce CHANGELOG merge conflicts.

.gitattributes

+CHANGELOG merge=union
\ No newline at end of file

CHANGELOG

-Note: The upcoming release below contains empty lines.
-This helps to reduce the number of merge conflicts.
-Scroll down to see the released versions of GitLab.
-Please pick a random empty line to add new content.
-
 v 7.8.0 (unreleased)
   - Replace highlight.js with rouge-fork rugments (Stefan Tatschner)
   - Make project search case insensitive (Hannes Rosenögger)
@@ -19,58 +14,36 @@ v 7.8.0 (unreleased)
   - Add notes for label changes in issue and merge requests
   - Show tags in commit view (Hannes Rosenögger)
   - Only count a user's vote once on a merge request or issue (Michael Clarke)
-  - 
   - Increate font size when browse source files and diffs
   - Create new file in empty repository using GitLab UI
-  - 
   - Ability to clone project using oauth2 token
-  - 
   - Upgrade Sidekiq gem to version 3.3.0
   - Stop git zombie creation during force push check
   - Show success/error messages for test setting button in services
   - Added Rubocop for code style checks
   - Fix commits pagination
-  - 
   - Async load a branch information at the commit page
   - Disable blacklist validation for project names
   - Allow configuring protection of the default branch upon first push (Marco Wessel)
-  -
   - Add gitlab.com importer
   - Add an ability to login with gitlab.com
-  - 
   - Add a commit calendar to the user profile (Hannes Rosenögger)  
-  - 
   - Submit comment on command-enter
   - Notify all members of a group when that group is mentioned in a comment, for example: `@gitlab-org` or `@sales`.
   - Extend issue clossing pattern to include "Resolve", "Resolves", "Resolved", "Resolving" and "Close"
-  - 
   - Fix long broadcast message cut-off on left sidebar (Visay Keo)
   - Add Project Avatars (Steven Thonus and Hannes Rosenögger)
-  - 
-  - 
   - Password reset token validity increased from 2 hours to 2 days since it is also send on account creation.
-  - 
   - Edit group members via API
   - Enable raw image paste from clipboard, currently Chrome only (Marco Cyriacks)
-  - 
-  - 
   - Add action property to merge request hook (Julien Bianchi)
-  - 
   - Remove duplicates from group milestone participants list.
-  - 
-  - 
   - Add a new API function that retrieves all issues assigned to a single milestone (Justin Whear and Hannes Rosenögger)
-  - 
-  - 
   - API: Access groups with their path (Julien Bianchi)
   - Added link to milestone and keeping resource context on smaller viewports for issues and merge requests (Jason Blanchard)
-  - 
   - Allow notification email to be set separately from primary email.
-  - 
   - API: Add support for editing an existing project (Mika Mäenpää and Hannes Rosenögger) 
-  - 
   - Don't have Markdown preview fail for long comments/wiki pages.
-  - 
   - When test web hook - show error message instead of 500 error page if connection to hook url was reset
   - Added support for firing system hooks on group create/destroy and adding/removing users to group (Boyan Tabakov)
   - Added persistent collapse button for left side nav bar (Jason Blanchard)

doc/release/monthly.md

@@ -87,20 +87,13 @@ asked if there is anything missing.
 There are three changelogs that need to be updated: CE, EE and CI.
-Remove the Note text in the stable branches.
-
 ## Create RC1 (CE, EE, CI)
 [Follow this How-to guide](howto_rc1.md) to create RC1.
 ## Prepare CHANGELOG for next release
-Once the stable branches have been created, update the CHANGELOG in `master` with the upcoming version and add 70 empty
-lines to it. We do this in order to avoid merge conflicts when merging the CHANGELOG.
-
-Make sure that the CHANGELOG im master contains the following disclaimer message:
-
-> Note: The upcoming release contains empty lines to reduce the number of merge conflicts, scroll down to see past releases.
+Once the stable branches have been created, update the CHANGELOG in `master` with the upcoming version.
 ## QA