This is a walkthrough of the NumPy 2.1.0 release on Linux, modified for building with GitHub Actions and cibuildwheels and uploading to the anaconda.org staging repository for NumPy. The commands can be copied into the command line, but be sure to replace 2.1.0 by the correct version. This should be read together with the :ref:`general release guide <prepare_release>`.

Before beginning to make a release, use the requirements/*_requirements.txt files to ensure that you have the needed software. Most software can be installed with pip, but some will require apt-get, dnf, or whatever your system uses for software. You will also need a GitHub personal access token (PAT) to push the documentation. There are a few ways to streamline things:

• Git can be set up to use a keyring to store your GitHub personal access token. Search online for the details.
• You can use the keyring app to store the PyPI password for twine. See the online twine documentation for details.

When adding or dropping Python versions, three files need to be edited:

• .github/workflows/wheels.yml # for github cibuildwheel
• tools/ci/cirrus_wheels.yml # for cibuildwheel aarch64/arm64 builds
• pyproject.toml # for classifier and minimum version check.

Make these changes in an ordinary PR against main and backport if necessary. Add [wheel build] at the end of the title line of the commit summary so that wheel builds will be run to test the changes. We currently release wheels for new Python versions after the first Python rc once manylinux and cibuildwheel support it. For Python 3.11 we were able to release within a week of the rc1 announcement.

Changes that have been marked for this release must be backported to the maintenance/2.1.x branch.

Look at the issues/prs with 2.1.0 milestones and either push them off to a later version, or maybe remove the milestone. You may need to add a milestone.

Four documents usually need to be updated or created for the release PR:

• The changelog
• The release notes
• The .mailmap file
• The pyproject.toml file

These changes should be made in an ordinary PR against the maintenance branch. The commit heading should contain a [wheel build] directive to test if the wheels build. Other small, miscellaneous fixes may be part of this PR. The commit message might be something like:

REL: Prepare for the NumPy 2.1.0 release [wheel build]

- Create 2.1.0-changelog.rst.
- Update 2.1.0-notes.rst.
- Update .mailmap.
- Update pyproject.toml

Check the pyproject.toml file and set the release version if needed:

$ gvim pyproject.toml

Check that the pavement.py file points to the correct release notes. It should have been updated after the last release, but if not, fix it now. Also make sure that the notes have an entry in the release.rst file:

$ gvim pavement.py doc/source/release.rst

The changelog is generated using the changelog tool:

$ spin changelog $GITHUB v2.0.0..maintenance/2.1.x > doc/changelog/2.1.0-changelog.rst

where GITHUB contains your GitHub access token. The text will need to be checked for non-standard contributor names and dependabot entries removed. It is also a good idea to remove any links that may be present in the PR titles as they don't translate well to markdown, replace them with monospaced text. The non-standard contributor names should be fixed by updating the .mailmap file, which is a lot of work. It is best to make several trial runs before reaching this point and ping the malefactors using a GitHub issue to get the needed information.

If there are any release notes snippets in doc/release/upcoming_changes/, run spin notes, which will incorporate the snippets into the doc/source/release/notes-towncrier.rst file and delete the snippets:

$ spin notes
$ gvim doc/source/release/notes-towncrier.rst doc/source/release/2.1.0-notes.rst

Once the notes-towncrier contents has been incorporated into release note the .. include:: notes-towncrier.rst directive can be removed. The notes will always need some fixups, the introduction will need to be written, and significant changes should be called out. For patch releases the changelog text may also be appended, but not for the initial release as it is too long. Check previous release notes to see how this is done.

Note that in the code snippets below, upstream refers to the root repository on GitHub and origin to its fork in your personal GitHub repositories. You may need to make adjustments if you have not forked the repository but simply cloned it locally. You can also edit .git/config and add upstream if it isn't already present.

Checkout the branch for the release, make sure it is up to date, and clean the repository:

$ git checkout maintenance/2.1.x
$ git pull upstream maintenance/2.1.x
$ git submodule update
$ git clean -xdfq

Sanity check:

$ python3 -m spin test -m full

Tag the release and push the tag. This requires write permission for the numpy repository:

$ git tag -a -s v2.1.0 -m"NumPy 2.1.0 release"
$ git push upstream v2.1.0

If you need to delete the tag due to error:

$ git tag -d v2.1.0
$ git push --delete upstream v2.1.0

Tagging the build at the beginning of this process will trigger a wheel build via cibuildwheel and upload wheels and an sdist to the staging repo. The CI run on github actions (for all x86-based and macOS arm64 wheels) takes about 1 1/4 hours. The CI runs on cirrus (for aarch64 and M1) take less time. You can check for uploaded files at the staging repository, but note that it is not closely synched with what you see of the running jobs.

If you wish to manually trigger a wheel build, you can do so:

• On github actions -> Wheel builder there is a "Run workflow" button, click on it and choose the tag to build
• On Cirrus we don't currently have an easy way to manually trigger builds and uploads.

If a wheel build fails for unrelated reasons, you can rerun it individually:

• On github actions select Wheel builder click on the commit that contains the build you want to rerun. On the left there is a list of wheel builds, select the one you want to rerun and on the resulting page hit the counterclockwise arrows button.
• On cirrus, log into cirrusci, look for the v2.1.0 tag and rerun the failed jobs.

When the wheels have all been successfully built and staged, download them from the Anaconda staging directory using the tools/download-wheels.py script:

$ cd ../numpy
$ mkdir -p release/installers
$ python3 tools/download-wheels.py 2.1.0

This needs to be done after all installers are downloaded, but before the pavement file is updated for continued development:

$ paver write_release

Upload to PyPI using twine. A recent version of twine of is needed after recent PyPI changes, version 3.4.1 was used here:

$ cd ../numpy
$ twine upload release/installers/*.whl
$ twine upload release/installers/*.gz  # Upload last.

If one of the commands breaks in the middle, you may need to selectively upload the remaining files because PyPI does not allow the same file to be uploaded twice. The source file should be uploaded last to avoid synchronization problems that might occur if pip users access the files while this is in process, causing pip to build from source rather than downloading a binary wheel. PyPI only allows a single source distribution, here we have chosen the zip archive.

Go to https://github.com/numpy/numpy/releases, there should be a v2.1.0 tag, click on it and hit the edit button for that tag and update the title to 'v2.1.0 (<date>). There are two ways to add files, using an editable text window and as binary uploads. Start by editing the release/README.md that is translated from the rst version using pandoc. Things that will need fixing: PR lines from the changelog, if included, are wrapped and need unwrapping, links should be changed to monospaced text. Then copy the contents to the clipboard and paste them into the text window. It may take several tries to get it look right. Then

• Upload release/installers/numpy-2.1.0.tar.gz as a binary file.
• Upload release/README.rst as a binary file.
• Upload doc/changelog/2.1.0-changelog.rst as a binary file.
• Check the pre-release button if this is a pre-releases.
• Hit the {Publish,Update} release button at the bottom.

This step is only needed for final releases and can be skipped for pre-releases and most patch releases. make merge-doc clones the numpy/doc repo into doc/build/merge and updates it with the new documentation:

$ git clean -xdfq
$ git co v2.1.0
$ rm -rf doc/build  # want version to be current
$ python -m spin docs merge-doc --build
$ pushd doc/build/merge

If the release series is a new one, you will need to add a new section to the doc/build/merge/index.html front page just after the "insert here" comment:

$ gvim index.html +/'insert here'

Further, update the version-switcher json file to add the new release and update the version marked (stable) and preferred:

$ gvim _static/versions.json

Then run update.py to update the version in _static:

$ python3 update.py

You can "test run" the new documentation in a browser to make sure the links work, although the version dropdown will not change, it pulls its information from numpy.org:

$ firefox index.html  # or google-chrome, etc.

Update the stable link and update:

$ ln -sfn 2.1 stable
$ ls -l  # check the link

Once everything seems satisfactory, update, commit and upload the changes:

$ git commit -a -m"Add documentation for v2.1.0"
$ git push [email protected]:numpy/doc
$ popd

Create release notes for next release and edit them to set the version. These notes will be a skeleton and have little content:

$ git checkout -b begin-2.1.1 maintenance/2.1.x
$ cp doc/source/release/template.rst doc/source/release/2.1.1-notes.rst
$ gvim doc/source/release/2.1.1-notes.rst
$ git add doc/source/release/2.1.1-notes.rst

Add new release notes to the documentation release list and update the RELEASE_NOTES variable in pavement.py:

$ gvim doc/source/release.rst pavement.py

Update the version in pyproject.toml:

$ gvim pyproject.toml

Commit the result:

$ git commit -a -m"MAINT: Prepare 2.1.x for further development"
$ git push origin HEAD

Go to GitHub and make a PR. It should be merged quickly.

This assumes that you have forked https://github.com/numpy/numpy.org:

$ cd ../numpy.org
$ git checkout main
$ git pull upstream main
$ git checkout -b announce-numpy-2.1.0
$ gvim content/en/news.md

• For all releases, go to the bottom of the page and add a one line link. Look to the previous links for example.
• For the *.0 release in a cycle, add a new section at the top with a short description of the new features and point the news link to it.

commit and push:

$ git commit -a -m"announce the NumPy 2.1.0 release"
$ git push origin HEAD

Go to GitHub and make a PR.

The release should be announced on the numpy-discussion, scipy-devel, and python-announce-list mailing lists. Look at previous announcements for the basic template. The contributor and PR lists are the same as generated for the release notes above. If you crosspost, make sure that python-announce-list is BCC so that replies will not be sent to that list.

Checkout main and forward port the documentation changes. You may also want to update these notes if procedures have changed or improved:

$ git checkout -b post-2.1.0-release-update main
$ git checkout maintenance/2.1.x doc/source/release/2.1.0-notes.rst
$ git checkout maintenance/2.1.x doc/changelog/2.1.0-changelog.rst
$ git checkout maintenance/2.1.x .mailmap  # only if updated for release.
$ gvim doc/source/release.rst  # Add link to new notes
$ git status  # check status before commit
$ git commit -a -m"MAINT: Update main after 2.1.0 release."
$ git push origin HEAD

Go to GitHub and make a PR.