release-prep

name	release-prep
description	Review environment variables, migrations, config differences, rollback paths, and operational checklists before release. Use it to determine whether completed work is actually ready to ship.

Release Prep

Purpose

Check whether a completed feature or application can be deployed safely to production.

Core Principles

1. Separate code quality from release readiness.
2. Judge readiness from the production environment perspective, not the dev environment.
3. Check environment variables, secrets, and network config differences first.
4. Review data changes together with rollout order and rollback paths.
5. Plan for recovery from failed deployments, not only successful ones.
6. Do not leave operational steps vague or implicit.

Inputs

• Description of the feature or app being released
• Related code changes
• Environment variables or deployment config
• Database migration, seed, or backfill details
• Target environments such as dev, staging, or prod
• Monitoring, alerting, or rollback procedures, if available

Workflow

1. Summarize the release scope and user impact in one line.
2. Document environment-specific differences and required variables.
3. Review database changes and rollout order.
4. Check external dependencies and credential injection paths.
5. List health checks, logs, and monitoring items to inspect after deployment.
6. Define rollback or workaround steps for failure cases.

Output Format

Release Summary

• Deployment target
• User impact range

Pre-Release Checks

• Required environment variables
• Config or infrastructure changes
• Readiness of external dependencies

Data Change Review

• Whether migrations are involved
• Rollout order
• Whether backfill or data-integrity validation is required

Deployment Procedure

• Tasks before deployment
• Checks during deployment
• Checks after deployment

Rollback and Response

• Whether rollback is possible
• Rollback steps
• Workarounds during incidents

Key Risks

• Operational outage risk
• Configuration omission risk
• Items that still need confirmation

When Information Is Missing

• Split missing operational data into explicit follow-up items.
• Treat unclear migration impact as elevated data risk.
• Document any non-automated procedure as a manual checklist.