release-engineer

Automates release readiness checks, changelog generation, version tagging, and registry publishing for git repositories.

4|2|Updated Jan 27, 2026
One-click install
npx skills add https://github.com/Arete-Consortium/ai-skills --skill release-engineer-arete-consortium
Or copy as Structured Prompt for Agent▼
Please help me install this Agent Skill.
Skill: release-engineer
Source: https://github.com/Arete-Consortium/ai-skills/tree/main/agents/analysis/release-engineer
Command: npx skills add https://github.com/Arete-Consortium/ai-skills --skill release-engineer-arete-consortium

SYSTEM DOCUMENTATION & REQUIREMENTS

💡 This Skill requires build, twine.

What problem does it solve? Shipping software involves repetitive, error-prone steps — verifying tests pass, writing changelogs, bumping versions, tagging, and publishing — that developers often skip or perform inconsistently, leading to broken or undocumented releases. ## Core Features & Use Cases - Preflight Readiness Gates: Runs five verification gates (code health, documentation, metadata, security, CI) and returns a READY, NOT_READY, or READY_WITH_WARNINGS verdict with blockers and warnings. - Full Ship Pipeline: Bumps semantic versions, generates categorized CHANGELOG entries from git history, commits, tags, pushes, and optionally publishes to PyPI, npm, or crates.io with explicit user confirmation. - Portfolio Mode: Assesses release readiness across multiple repositories at once and surfaces quick wins that unblock the most releases. - Use Case: After resolving issues flagged by a technical debt audit, ask the agent to ship version 1.2.0 of your Python package — it verifies all gates, generates the changelog, tags the release, and pauses for confirmation before publishing to PyPI. ## Quick Start Ask the agent to run a release preflight check on your repository to see whether it is ready to ship.

Frequently Asked Questions about release-engineer

High-intent search queries and answers about installing and using this skill.

FAQPage Schema
How do I check if my repository is ready to release?▼

Run the preflight_check operation with the absolute path to your repository. It evaluates five gates — code health, documentation, metadata, security, and CI — and returns a verdict of READY, NOT_READY, or READY_WITH_WARNINGS along with blockers and warnings.

How do I generate a changelog from git history?▼

The ship operation scans git log since the last tag and categorizes commits into Added, Changed, Fixed, Removed, and Security sections. It then prepends a formatted entry for the new version to CHANGELOG.md automatically.

Can it publish packages to PyPI, npm, or crates.io?▼

Yes, the ship operation supports pypi, npm, and crates as publish targets using build/twine, npm publish, or cargo publish. Publishing always pauses for explicit user confirmation because published packages are effectively permanent.

What happens if tests fail before a release?▼

A test failure blocks the release with zero automatic retries. The agent reports which gate failed and why, and the release cannot proceed until tests pass or the user explicitly overrides the blocker.

When should I not use this release automation approach?▼

Do not use it for auditing code quality or tech debt, debugging failing CI pipelines, or writing application code fixes. It also should not be used on repositories with no tests and no CI, since releasing untested code creates false readiness.

Can I check release readiness across multiple repositories at once?▼

Yes, the portfolio_check operation runs preflight across all repositories in a directory and produces a shipping status matrix. It groups repos into shippable, almost ready, and not ready, and lists quick wins ordered by lowest effort first.