Can we use smart-release with publish=false in Cargo.toml?

[lquerel]

I couldn't successfully use cargo smart-release with a workspace consisting of multiple crates that are marked as non-publishable on crates.io. However, I want to update the changelog and create a release on GitHub. Is this a limitation, or am I using it incorrectly? Thank you.

[Byron]

cargo smart-release has a bunch of customization options that allow to forgo the publishing. --no-publish should do the trick.

Reference

❯ cargo smart-release -h
Release workspace crates fearlessly

Usage: cargo smart-release [OPTIONS] [CRATES]...

Arguments:
  [CRATES]...  The name of the crates to be released, along with all of their dependencies if needed

Options:
  -h, --help  Print help (see more with '--help')

MAJOR:
  -e, --execute
          Actually perform a release. Dry-run mode is the default
  -u, --update-crates-index
          Always update the crates-index beforehand. It is used to determine if the computed version to be published was already published
      --no-changelog
          Don't generate a changelog automatically or update existing ones. This is useful if a manual changelog is preferred or if its format strays to far from the suggestions on <https://keepachangelog.com>, making generated content impossible to properly integrate with what's there
  -b, --bump <BUMP>
          Specify the kind of version bump you seek for the crate and potentially it's dependencies
  -d, --bump-dependencies <BUMP_DEPENDENCIES>
          Specify the kind of version bump to apply to dependencies only

CUSTOMIZATION:
  -v, --verbose                        Provide more detailed messages on the INFO log level in dry-run mode
      --dry-run-cargo-publish          Additionally run 'cargo publish --dry-run' when --execute is not set. This can be useful to see which local crates do not build with the released versions of their workspace dependencies anymore
      --no-bump-on-demand              Always bump versions as specified by --bump or --bump-dependencies even if this is not required to publish a new version to crates.io
      --auto-publish-of-stable-crates  Allow to also publish stable crates when discovering changed crates, bumping their version according to `-d <spec>`
      --no-publish                     Don't actually publish, but perform all other operations like manifest adjustments and tag creation
      --no-tag                         Don't create tags indicating the version numbers of all crates that are to be published after changing their manifests
      --no-push                        Don't push tags and the HEAD branch after any successful run of `cargo publish`
      --no-dependencies                Do not take into consideration any dependencies of the crates to publish [aliases: only]

CHANGELOG:
      --no-changelog-github-release
          Do not create a github release (if the repo is located on github) reflecting the content of the changelogs most recent release section
      --no-changelog-links
          Do not generate links to commits and issues when writing the changelogs. This currently only works for GitHub
      --changelog-without <CHANGELOG_WITHOUT>
          Omits these kinds of generated changelog content, values are 'clippy', 'commit-statistics' and 'commit-details'
      --no-changelog-preview
          If unset, about-to-be changed changelogs will be previewed using 'bat', if available, and when executing
      --capitalize-commit
          Capitalize commit messages

CHANGELOG-EXPERT:
      --allow-fully-generated-changelogs
          If changelogs are generated from git-conventional comments extracted from the commit history exclusively, publishes will fail as in order to give opportunity to author at least a portion of the upcoming release

EXPERT:
      --allow-dirty
          Allow publishes to take place on a dirty working tree. Really not recommended alongside --execute
      --no-conservative-pre-release-version-handling
          Do not force 0.X version requirements to be updated in dependent crates on patch update, forcing an update of the lower bound
      --no-isolate-dependencies-from-breaking-changes
          Do not bump versions of dependent crates if the crates to be published indicate breaking changes with their semantic version
      --dangerously-pass-no-verify
          Pass --no-verify to 'cargo publish' which should only be a last resort when fixing up packages that otherwise wouldn't publish, but need to be publish to resolve the situation
      --ignore-instability
          If set it will be allowed to publish crates with cycles to other workspace crates which are not published

[lquerel]

This is the first option I tried but without success :-)
See the output with this option enabled.

When there's no publishing on crates.io, it seems there's also no update to the changelog or creation of a new release on GitHub, at least in my experience.

[Byron]

Maybe there is legitimately no change to the crate according to git so it refuses to do anything - I think that's unrelated to being publishable or not.

If it doesn't work and you really want it, you are free to submit a PR with fixes. Please note though that all this tool really has to do is to publish gitoxide and it only receives the bare minimum maintenance to keep achieving that. It's no general-purpose tool like cargo release for example, which one day is going to grow changelog support, I am sure.

[lquerel]

I'm not entirely sure what the issue is, but I definitely have a pending commit locally. If I find the time to address this, I'll create a PR. Thank you.