Generate Changelog


Generate a changelog from git commits. This is meant to be used so that for every patch, minor, or major version, you update the changelog _prior_ to running npm version so that the git tag contains the commit that updated both the changelog and version.

Installation

You can either install it as a dev dependency to be referenced in your npm scripts, or you can install this module globally to be used for all of your repos on your local machine.

``bash
$ npm i generate-changelog -D # install it as a dev dependency


OR


$ npm i generate-changelog -g # install it globally
`

Usage

To use this module, your commit messages have to be in this format:

`
type(category): description [flags]
`

Where type is one of the following:

* breaking
* build
* ci
* chore
* docs
* feat
* fix
* other
* perf
* refactor
* revert
* style
* test

Where flags is an optional comma-separated list of one or more of the following (must be surrounded in square brackets):

* breaking: alters type to be a breaking change

And category can be anything of your choice. If you use a type not found in the list (but it still follows the same format of the message), it'll be grouped under other.

$3

You can run this module as a CLI app that prepends the new logs to a file (recommended):

`bash
$ changelog -h

Usage: generate [options]

Generate a changelog from git commits.

Options:

-h, --help output usage information
-V, --version output the version number
-p, --patch create a patch changelog
-m, --minor create a minor changelog
-M, --major create a major changelog
-t, --tag generate from specific tag or range (e.g. v1.2.3 or v1.2.3..v1.2.4)
-x, --exclude exclude selected commit types (comma separated)
-f, --file [file] file to write to, defaults to ./CHANGELOG.md, use - for stdout
-u, --repo-url [url] specify the repo URL for commit links, defaults to checking the package.json
-a, --allow-unknown allow unkown commit types
`

It's possible to create a ./CHANGELOG.md file for a specific commit range:

`bash
generate-changelog 420c945...2a83752
`

Git tags are supported too:

`bash
generate-changelog release/3.1.2822...release/3.1.2858
`

$3

You can write a script that calls the generate function and does whatever you want with the new logs:

`js
var Changelog = require('generate-changelog');
var Fs = require('fs');

return Changelog.generate({ patch: true, repoUrl: 'https://github.com/lob/generate-changelog' })
.then(function (changelog) {
Fs.writeFileSync('./CHANGELOG.md', changelog);
});
`

$3

The way that I would recommend using this module would be the way it's being used in this module: as npm scripts. You should install it as a dev dependency and then add the following to the scripts object in your package.json:

`json
"release:major": "changelog -M && git add CHANGELOG.md && git commit -m 'updated CHANGELOG.md' && npm version major && git push origin && git push origin --tags",
"release:minor": "changelog -m && git add CHANGELOG.md && git commit -m 'updated CHANGELOG.md' && npm version minor && git push origin && git push origin --tags",
"release:patch": "changelog -p && git add CHANGELOG.md && git commit -m 'updated CHANGELOG.md' && npm version patch && git push origin && git push origin --tags",
`

Testing

To run the test suite, just clone the repository and run the following:

`bash
$ npm i
$ npm test
`

Contributing

To contribute, please see the CONTRIBUTING.md file.

License

This project is released under the MIT license, which can be found in LICENSE.txt`.