Generate Comprehensive Release Notes

This skill writes release notes that communicate software changes to end users, developers, support teams, and stakeholders. It applies an audience-first approach (benefits for end users, technical details and breaking changes for developers, behavioral changes for support, business impact for stakeholders) and an information hierarchy: breaking changes first, then new features, enhancements, bug fixes, and technical/internal changes last. It provides a standard release notes template with highlights, breaking changes, new features, enhancements, bug fixes, technical changes, and documentation links. Voice and tone guidance runs throughout: professional but approachable phrasing that avoids jargon for general audiences, confident statements ("We've improved" rather than a hedged "We think we've improved"), and an empathetic acknowledgment of the inconvenience a breaking change causes rather than glossing over it.

Use this skill when drafting release notes for a new version - structuring breaking changes with migration deadlines, writing a developer-facing changelog with new/deprecated API endpoints and a before/after code migration snippet, writing end-user-facing "what's new" copy that leads with benefits, or adapting the same release across channels (in-app, email, documentation site, social media).

It does not cover the underlying changelog generation from commit history or automated versioning - it is focused on the writing, structure, and audience-adaptation of the release notes content itself.

Inputs are typically a list of changes for a release (features, fixes, breaking changes) and the target audiences. Outputs include a structured release notes document, for example a breaking-changes and new-features section:

### Release v2.4.0 - "Velocity" (March 15, 2024)

###  Breaking Changes
- **API v1 Deprecation**: API v1 endpoints removed. Migrate to v2 by April 1st
- **Configuration Change**: `auth.legacy_mode` config removed

###  New Features
### Dashboard Analytics
- Real-time user activity tracking
- Customizable metric widgets
- **Available to**: Pro and Enterprise plans

Other outputs include a developer-facing API changelog with new endpoints and a before/after authentication migration code snippet, end-user "what's new" copy leading with benefits, a release metadata block (version, codename, breaking_changes flag, supported/deprecated versions) for automation, and a quality checklist covering migration instructions, audience-appropriate detail, and proofreading.

Product managers, technical writers, and engineering leads drafting release notes who need consistent structure and audience-appropriate framing rather than an unstructured list of commits. Content guidelines extend to technical accuracy too: include version numbers, dates, and affected components; provide rollback instructions for critical changes; link to detailed documentation; and specify environment requirements where relevant.