CHANGELOG file

[tony]

I've seen an earlier issue on this closed (#2859) as well as a recent issue bringing up changelogs (#12210)!

Feature

Single file changelog, with changes release manager deems most significant weighted to the top

Pitch

Problem
I feel it's really difficult a user to track changes the maintainer deems useful. Users are left to git log or taking several clicks to find release notes.

A normal user is going to end up being a few releases behind, and they may be overwhelmed by how much effort it takes to see what changed

What I think is most helpful
I personally find git logs interesting to read, however, I imagine mypy may be far along enough its worth keeping a changelog.

When a maintainer is cutting the release, they can go back and take a few minutes to weigh what's happened since last release and curate highlights of the changelog.

Why I think a single, curated changelog is best

• Can be linked to via PyPI, one page
• No extra clicks or pagination
• Search via control-f / command-f
• Scroll
• Can be linked to git tags (in future release, if a changelog is added)

Other references

• Add a CHANGELOG #2859
• Time-based release process #12210: Changelog is referenced here: Time-based release process #12210 (comment)

[tony]

It would be a dream to have this (still!)

[jessestricker]

for anyone, who like me ended up here in search of a changelog file:
there is none, but the release notes are available on their blog, which you can find here:
https://mypy-lang.blogspot.com/

i'm in favor of a proper CHANGELOG file, though

[hauntsaninja]

We're going to try to keep release notes inside the repo, see #16280
These are just the equivalent of the blogspot posts, for a full revision history, git log will always be authoritative

[tony]

Thanks @hauntsaninja!