View source for VPP/Working with the 16.06 Throttle Branch

== Intro ==

vpp's branching structure currently is:
<pre>
----------- master ---------------------------->
                                 \
                                  \------ stable/1606------->
</pre>

The master branch is where the bulk of development takes place.

The stable/1606 branch is the 'throttle' for preparing the 16.06 release.  Only bug fixes should go into stable/1606.

Bug fixes that *should* be in stable/1606 should be merged into stable/1606 before being merged into master
(at least until 16.06 is released).

== How to get the stable/1606 branch ==

From your current git repo, you should be able to simply do a 

<code>
git pull
</code> 

which will pull down the new origin/stable/1606 and create a local stable/1606 branch.  Then just

git checkout stable/1606

== How to push code to stable/1606 ==

From any branch you created from stable/1606, you just need to do a 

<code>
git review
</code>

=== Understanding why 'git review' just works ===

It can be helpful to understand why 'git review' works.
In vpp/.gitreview there is useful metadata to help git-review.  On the stable/1606 branch, that files contents are:

<pre>
oberon:vpp hagbard$ cat .gitreview 
[gerrit]
host=gerrit.fd.io
port=29418
project=vpp
defaultbranch=stable/1606
</pre>

The 'defaultbranch=stable/1606' tells git-review the branch to which to push your changes.  As long as that value is set in your .gitreview, your patches will go to stable/1606.
If that value is not set (as it isn't in .gitreview on master), your changes go to master.

Since any commit you do that is on a branch off of stable/1606 *locally* should have the correct .gitreview, you *probably* don't have to think about it to much :)

== Cherry picking in the gerrit UI ==

If you push a patch to a branch in gerrit, you can, from the gerrit web UI, you should have a 'Cherry Pick' button near the 'Rebase' button that will allow you to cherry-pick that gerrit to a different branch (thus creating a new gerrit to be removed).  Naturally, this can only work if the cherry-pick can be done without manual corrections.