We will setup semantic-release to calculate a new semantic version from out commits and release that to npm.

Calculating version

As long as our commits follow the conventional commit style, semantic-release can infer whether the next semantic version will be a major, minot or patch.

Semantic Versions

Semantic versions are a convention that indicates whether the next version is a breaking change or not.

They are in the format of major.minor.patch (e.g. 1.23.456).

Conventional Commits

Conventional commits prefix a git commit message with a label that indicates the type of change being committed.

feat: add xyz feature

fix: handle divide by 0 case

# breaking change (!)
feat!: drop v1 api

Setup

1. Install

   yarn install --dev semantic-release @semantic-release/git

2. Configure registry in package.json

   "name": "@github-username/package"
   "publishConfig": {
       "registry": "https://npm.pkg.github.com"
   }

3. Configure semantic-release in .releaserc.json

   {
       "release": {
           "branches": [
           {
               "name": "master"
           },
           {
               "name": "beta",
               "prerelease": true
           }
           ],
           "debug": true
       },
       "plugins": [
           "@semantic-release/commit-analyzer",
           "@semantic-release/release-notes-generator",
           "@semantic-release/npm",
           "@semantic-release/git"
       ]
   }

   • Branches
     • Release from master branch
     • Pre-release from beta branch
   • Plugins
     • @semantic-release/commit-analyzer calculates semantic version from conventional commits
     • @semantic-release/release-notes-generator generates release notes from conventional commits
     • @semantic-release/npm publishes to configured registry
     • @semantic-release/git integrates with git

4. Trigger release

   yarn semantic-release

   • Use flag --dry-run to test configuration without uploading to registry
   • Provide a token for the registry through the .npmrc or NPM_TOKEN environment variable
   • Set CI=true to avoid prompts