Stash Merging Hotfix from previous tag back into master

[josh gold]

We are following the gitflow workflow for our Stash project, but we've hit a snag and I can't find anything specific to our issue in the Atlassian documentation. Here's the scenario:

Master branch is tagged with v1.0 and then v2.0. Bug is found against v1.0, hotfix/ branch is created against v1.0. But what is the best way to merge back in? The Git Tutorial says I should merge hotfixes back into master and down to develop, but in this case, merging to master doesn't seem what I want. Am I stuck with making my hotfix/ branch my tagged v1.0.1?

There is a similar question on SO, but I didn't like the answers ;-)

Thanks!

[Stefan Saasen · Accepted solution]

You may not like this answer either but I thinkg gitflow is not the best fit if you care about old releases.

In Stash we are using http://blogs.atlassian.com/2013/10/inside-atlassian-feature-branching-on-the-stash-team/with long running release branches and a clear policy on how bug fixes get merged and how those change flow from the oldest to newer release branches up to master.

I've also tried to capture the underlying principles (when to merge what where) here: http://blogs.atlassian.com/2013/11/the-essence-of-branch-based-workflows/

[josh gold]

Thank you Stefan! Your article was great. To clarify, you do not use a develop/ branch, but rather master/ for integration? And then your hotfixes will get to your release and back to master. Do you tag master/ or release/ ?

[Timothy]

If you have a a branch that sits below master (and in this case develop), I think you should go to that branch first.

Take a look at Maintenance Branches here (https://www.atlassian.com/git/workflows#!workflow-gitflow).