changelogen

Generate Beautiful Changelogs using Conventional Commits

Quick Start

Generate a changelog in Markdown format and display in the console:

npx changelogen@latest

Generate a changelog, bump the version in package.json and update CHANGELOG.md (without commit):

npx changelogen@latest --bump

Bump the version, update CHANGELOG.md, make a git commit and tag, and sync a GitHub release (when the repo is on GitHub):

npx changelogen@latest --release

Without a GitHub token, changelogen opens a browser link so you can create the release manually. With a token (see changelogen gh release), the release is created automatically.

CLI Usage

npx changelogen@latest [...args] [--dir <dir>]

Arguments:

• --from: Start commit reference. When not provided, latest git tag will be used as default.
• --to: End commit reference. When not provided, latest commit in HEAD will be used as default.
• --dir: Path to git repository. When not provided, current working directory will be used as as default.
• --clean: Determine if the working directory is clean and if it is not clean, exit.
• --output: Changelog file name to create or update. Defaults to CHANGELOG.md and resolved relative to dir. Use --no-output to write to console only.
• --noAuthors: Skip contributors section in changelog.
• --bump: Determine semver change and update version in package.json.
• --release. Bumps version in package.json, creates a commit and git tags using local git, and creates or updates a GitHub release for the new version when the repository provider is GitHub. You can disable commit using --no-commit, tag using --no-tag, and the GitHub release using --no-github. You can enable the automatic push of the new tag and release commit to your git repository by adding --push.
• --publish. Publishes package as a new version on npm. You will need to set authorisation tokens separately via .npmrc or environment variables.
• --publishTag Use custom npm tag for publishing (Default is latest)
• --nameSuffix: Adds suffix to package name (Example: --nameSuffix canary renames foo to foo-canary)
• --versionSuffix: Adds suffix to package version. When set without value or to true, uses date + commit hash as commit
• --canary. Shortcut to --bump --versionSuffix (--nameSuffix will be also added if arg has a string value).
• -r: Release as specific version.
• --major: Bump as a semver-major version
• --minor: Bump as a semver-minor version
• --patch: Bump as a semver-patch version
• --premajor: Bump as a semver-premajor version, can set id with string.
• --preminor: Bump as a semver-preminor version, can set id with string.
• --prepatch: Bump as a semver-prepatch version, can set id with string.
• --prerelease: Bump as a semver-prerelease version, can set id with string.
• --hideAuthorEmail: Do not include author email in changelog if github username cannot be found.

[!NOTE] Version numbers starting with 0. or 0.0. follow different rules.

In these cases, the second or third digit is treated as the major version. They use the formats 0.major.minor and 0.0.major instead of the standard major.minor.patch.

To ensure consistent semantic versioning, start version numbering at 1.0.0.

changelogen gh release

Changelogen has built-in functionality to sync with Github releases.

--release already runs this sync for the version it just bumped. Use changelogen gh release to sync releases manually (for example older versions from CHANGELOG.md) without bumping again.

In order to manually sync a release, you can use changelogen gh release. It will parse current CHANGELOG.md from current repository (local, then remote) and create or update releases.

Usage:

npx changelogen@latest gh release [all|versions...] [--dir] [--token]

To enable this integration, make sure there is a valid repository field in package.json or repo is set in .changelogenrc.

By default in unauthenticated mode, changelogen will open a browser link to make manual release. By providing github token, it can be automated.

• Using environment variables or .env, use CHANGELOGEN_TOKENS_GITHUB or GITHUB_TOKEN or GH_TOKEN
• Using CLI args, use --token <token>
• Using global configuration, put tokens.github=<token> inside ~/.changlogenrc
• Using GitHub CLI token when authenticated with gh auth login

Configuration

Configuration is loaded by unjs/c12 from cwd. You can use either changelog.config.json, changelog.config.{ts,js,mjs,cjs}, .changelogrc or use the changelog field in package.json.

See ./src/config.ts for available options and defaults.

💻 Development

• Clone this repository
• Enable Corepack using corepack enable (use npm i -g corepack for Node.js < 16.10)
• Install dependencies using pnpm install
• Run interactive tests using pnpm dev

License

Made with 💛

Published under MIT License.