Every major (X) and minor (Y) release should come with its own release/vX.Y
branch. For a major version bump, base it on the master branch; for a minor
version bump, base it on an existing release/vX.Y branch. For these cases,
create the new branch from the base branch with git switch -c release/vX.Y.
Patch (Z) releases should be done out of an existing major/minor branch.
For a major release, bump the version in master (remember a -dev suffix) and
the version in the new branch. For a minor release, only bump the version in the
new branch. For a patch release, bump the version in the existing branch. The
version must be bumped in these files:
Commit and push the version bumps and ensure that CI is green for the release branch.
Next, run git tag vX.Y.Z -m vX.Y.Z -s to create and sign a release tag. Push
the tag and go to the
releases page to create a release
from it, ideally with some well-written release notes. If something goes wrong,
you can run git tag -d vX.Y.Z and git push origin :vX.Y.Z to delete the tag
until you resolve the issue(s), and then repeat this step.