Release Notes Skill

🎯 Use Case Demo

Scenario

Team is releasing v2.0.0 after 3 weeks of development. Product manager needs release notes for stakeholders, and developers need a technical changelog.

Before (Manual):

• Scroll through 47 merged PRs
• Read each one, categorize manually
• Write summary in Google Doc
• Format for different audiences
• Time: 2-3 hours

After (With Skill):

# Flight Booking API v2.0.0 Release Notes

## 🚀 New Features
- **Seat Selection** - Passengers can now choose their preferred seats (#12)
- **Meal Preferences** - Add dietary requirements to bookings (#15)
- **Multi-city Flights** - Book complex itineraries (#18)

## 🐛 Bug Fixes
- Fixed booking confirmation email not sending (#23)
- Resolved timezone issues in flight schedules (#25)

## 🔧 Improvements
- 40% faster search response times (#20)
- Improved error messages for validation (#22)

## 📦 Dependencies
- Updated .NET to 9.0
- Upgraded Entity Framework to 9.0.1

Time: 30 seconds

Time Saved: 2-3 hours per release

---

When to Use This Skill

• Before creating a new release
• When preparing sprint demo notes
• For stakeholder communication
• Generating CHANGELOG.md updates

Agent Instructions

When user asks for release notes:

1. Identify version range:

   • From: last release tag (e.g., v1.9.0)
   • To: current HEAD or specified tag

2. Gather data:

   # Get commits between versions
   git log v1.9.0..HEAD --oneline
   
   # Get merged PRs (with GitHub CLI)
   gh pr list --state merged --base main --json title,number,labels
   

3. Categorize changes:

   • Features (feat:, feature PRs)
   • Bug Fixes (fix:, bugfix PRs)
   • Breaking Changes (BREAKING:)
   • Dependencies (deps:, chore:)
   • Documentation (docs:)

4. Generate formatted notes:

   • Executive summary for stakeholders
   • Technical details for developers
   • Migration guide for breaking changes

Example Prompts

User: "Generate release notes for v2.0.0" → Compare v1.9.0..v2.0.0, generate notes

User: "What changed since last release?" → Find last tag, summarize changes

User: "Create changelog entry" → Generate CHANGELOG.md format

Demo Script

# 1. Show current state
git tag  # List existing releases

# 2. Ask agent: "Generate release notes from v1.0.0 to now"

# 3. Agent outputs categorized changelog

# 4. Copy to CHANGELOG.md or release page

Output Formats

Markdown (Default)

## [2.0.0] - 2025-12-25
### Added
- Seat selection feature
### Fixed  
- Email notification bug

Slack/Teams

🚀 *Flight Booking API v2.0.0*
✨ 3 new features | 🐛 5 bug fixes | 📦 2 dependency updates

Jira Release

Links each item to Jira tickets automatically

Benefits

Metric	Before	After	Improvement
Release note creation	2-3 hours	30 seconds	⬇️ 99%
Consistency	Variable	Standardized	✅ 100%
Missing items	Common	None	✅ Complete
Stakeholder updates	Delayed	Instant	⬆️ Real-time