name: release-notes description: Generate professional release notes from git commits between two refs with automated categorization. Use when creating release notes from git history.

Release Notes Generation Skill

Generate professional release notes from git commits between two refs with automated categorization.

Invocation

/release-notes [base] [head] [--version vX.Y.Z] [--output path]

Examples:

# Generate release notes for commits since last tag
/release-notes v1.0.0 HEAD --version v1.1.0

# Compare branches
/release-notes main feature/new-auth --version v2.0.0-beta

# Output to specific file
/release-notes v1.0.0 HEAD --version v1.1.0 --output docs/release-notes/250111-v1.1.0.md

Workflow

Step 1: Parse Commits

Execute the commit parser to extract structured data from git history:

node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/parse-commits.cjs <base> <head> [--with-files]

Output: JSON with commits array containing:

hash, shortHash - Commit identifiers
type, scope, description - Conventional commit parts
breaking - Boolean for breaking changes
author, date - Attribution
files - Changed files (with --with-files flag)

Step 2: Categorize Commits

Pipe parsed commits through the categorizer:

node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/parse-commits.cjs <base> <head> | \
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/categorize-commits.cjs

Categorization Rules:

Type	Category	User-Facing
`feat`	features	Yes
`fix`	fixes	Yes
`perf`	improvements	Yes
`docs`	docs	Yes (unless internal)
`refactor`	improvements	Technical only
`test`, `ci`, `build`, `chore`, `style`	internal	No

Excluded Patterns:

chore(deps): - Dependency updates
chore(config): - Configuration changes
[skip changelog] - Explicit skip
[ci skip] - CI markers

Step 3: Render Markdown

Generate the final release notes document:

node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/parse-commits.cjs <base> <head> | \
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/categorize-commits.cjs | \
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/render-template.cjs --version v1.1.0 --output docs/release-notes/250111-v1.1.0.md

Complete Pipeline

For generating release notes in a single command:

# Full pipeline with output to file
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/parse-commits.cjs v1.0.0 HEAD | \
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/categorize-commits.cjs | \
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/render-template.cjs --version v1.1.0 --output docs/release-notes/250111-v1.1.0.md

# Pipeline to stdout for review
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/parse-commits.cjs v1.0.0 HEAD | \
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/categorize-commits.cjs | \
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/render-template.cjs --version v1.1.0

Advanced Features

Service Boundary Detection

Analyze which services are affected by the release:

# Parse with file changes, then detect services
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/parse-commits.cjs v1.0.0 HEAD --with-files | \
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/detect-services.cjs

Output: Service impact analysis with severity levels (critical, high, medium, low)

Breaking Change Analysis

Enhanced breaking change detection with migration info extraction:

node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/parse-commits.cjs v1.0.0 HEAD | \
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/categorize-commits.cjs | \
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/detect-breaking.cjs

Detects:

BREAKING CHANGE: in commit body
! suffix on commit type (e.g., feat!:)
Migration instructions

PR Metadata Extraction

Extract and link pull request information:

# Extract PR numbers from commit messages
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/parse-commits.cjs v1.0.0 HEAD | \
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/extract-pr-metadata.cjs

# With GitHub API enrichment (requires gh CLI)
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/parse-commits.cjs v1.0.0 HEAD | \
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/extract-pr-metadata.cjs --fetch-gh

Extracts: PR numbers, titles, labels, authors from commits

Contributor Statistics

Generate detailed contributor stats:

node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/parse-commits.cjs v1.0.0 HEAD | \
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/contributor-stats.cjs

Output: Contributor list with commit counts, feature/fix breakdown

Version Bumping

Automatically determine and bump semantic version based on commit types:

# Auto-bump based on commits (feat→minor, fix→patch, BREAKING→major)
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/parse-commits.cjs v1.0.0 HEAD | \
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/bump-version.cjs

# Bump with prerelease tag
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/bump-version.cjs --prerelease beta

# Per-service versioning
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/bump-version.cjs --service platform-core

# Dry run (don't write version file)
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/bump-version.cjs --dry-run

Version Files:

Root: .version
Per-service: .versions/<service-name>.version

Quality Validation

Validate release notes against quality rules:

# Validate with default threshold (70)
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/validate-notes.cjs docs/release-notes/v1.1.0.md

# Custom threshold
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/validate-notes.cjs docs/release-notes/v1.1.0.md --threshold 80

# JSON output for CI
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/validate-notes.cjs docs/release-notes/v1.1.0.md --json

Validation Rules (100 points total):

Rule	Weight	Description
summary_exists	15	Has Summary section
summary_not_empty	10	Summary has content
has_version	10	Version number present
features_documented	10	Features properly formatted
fixes_documented	10	Bug fixes properly formatted
no_broken_links	10	No empty link references
contributors_listed	10	Contributors section present
has_date	5	Date present
no_todo_markers	5	No TODO/FIXME markers
proper_heading_hierarchy	5	Proper H1→H2 structure
no_placeholder_text	5	No placeholder text
technical_details_collapsed	5	Tech details in

LLM-Powered Transforms

Transform release notes for different audiences using Claude API:

# Requires ANTHROPIC_API_KEY environment variable
export ANTHROPIC_API_KEY="your-api-key"

# Create executive summary
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/transform-llm.cjs docs/release-notes/v1.1.0.md --transform executive

# Transform for business stakeholders
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/transform-llm.cjs docs/release-notes/v1.1.0.md --transform business --output docs/release-notes/v1.1.0-business.md

# Transform for end users
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/transform-llm.cjs docs/release-notes/v1.1.0.md --transform enduser

Transform Types:

Type	Description
`summarize`	Brief 3-5 bullet point summary
`business`	ROI-focused, business language
`enduser`	User-friendly, non-technical
`executive`	Strategic impact summary
`technical`	Enhanced technical details

Full Enhanced Pipeline

Combine all features for comprehensive release notes:

# Enhanced pipeline with service detection
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/parse-commits.cjs v1.0.0 HEAD --with-files | \
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/detect-services.cjs | \
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/categorize-commits.cjs | \
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/detect-breaking.cjs | \
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/contributor-stats.cjs | \
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/render-template.cjs --version v1.1.0

# With version bumping and validation
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/parse-commits.cjs v1.0.0 HEAD --with-files | \
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/bump-version.cjs | \
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/categorize-commits.cjs | \
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/render-template.cjs --output docs/release-notes/v1.1.0.md && \
node .claude/skills/release-notes/lib/validate-notes.cjs docs/release-notes/v1.1.0.md

Configuration

See config.yaml for:

categories - Commit type to section mapping
services - Service boundary detection by file patterns
exclude - Patterns to exclude from user-facing notes
output - Directory and filename format settings

Output Structure

# Release Notes: v1.1.0

**Date:** 2025-01-11
**Version:** v1.1.0
**Status:** Draft

---

## Summary
This release includes 3 new features, 2 improvements, 5 bug fixes.

## What's New
- **Add employee export endpoint** (API)
- **Implement dark mode toggle** (UI)

## Improvements
- **Optimize database queries** (Persistence)

## Bug Fixes
- **Fix date picker timezone issue** (Frontend)
- **Resolve null pointer in auth flow**

## Documentation
- **Update API documentation** (API)

## Breaking Changes
> **Warning**: The following changes may require migration

### Migrate to OAuth 2.1 (Auth)

Legacy JWT tokens no longer accepted.
Migration guide: docs/migrations/oauth-2.1.md

---

## Technical Details
<details>
<summary>For Developers</summary>

### Commits Included
| Hash | Type | Description |
|------|------|-------------|
| abc1234 | feat | Add employee export endpoint |
| def5678 | fix | Fix date picker timezone issue |
...

</details>

## Contributors
- @john.doe
- @jane.smith

---

*Generated with [Claude Code](https://claude.com/claude-code)*

Human Review Gate

Generated release notes are Draft status by default:

Review - Check accuracy, add context where needed
Enhance - Add migration steps, links, screenshots
Approve - Change status to "Released"
Publish - Commit and push

Integration with Other Skills

/commit - After generating notes, commit them
/git-manager - Create PR for release notes review
/docs-update - Update CHANGELOG.md with new release

Troubleshooting

No commits found

Verify the refs exist and have commits between them:

git log --oneline <base>..<head>

Non-conventional commits

Commits not following type(scope): description format go to "other" category. Consider running commitlint enforcement.

Missing scope context

Add scope mappings to config.yaml → services section for better context labels.

Task Planning Notes

Always plan and break many small todo tasks
Always add a final review todo task to review the works done at the end to find any fix or enhancement needed

release-notes

SKILL.md