Release Version Management#

The kpt repository uses independent versioning for each Go module and automates version injection into both the compiled binary and the Hugo-based documentation site.

Go Module Layout & Tag Conventions#

The repository contains several independent Go modules, each with its own go.mod and release lifecycle:

The CLI root module (github.com/kptdev/kpt) and the API module (github.com/kptdev/kpt/api) are released independently 1. The api module was split into its own independent Go module in PR #4537, and its Go release workflow watches for api/v* tags 2. A formal VERSIONING.md (added in PR #4622) documents compatibility guarantees — notably that minor versions are not guaranteed backwards compatible.

Binary Version Injection (LDFLAGS)#

For local/development builds, KPT_VERSION is set to a timestamp string development-<timestamp> in make/info.mk. This is injected into the binary at compile time via LDFLAGS targeting github.com/kptdev/kpt/run.version 3. Note: binaries built via go install (not from the Makefile) will report unknown for kpt version 4.

For tagged releases, GoReleaser replaces the version with the git tag value using the same ldflags pattern: -X github.com/kptdev/kpt/run.version={{.Version}}. The GoReleaser config lives at release/tag/goreleaser.yaml and builds binaries for darwin/linux × amd64/arm64, plus Docker images tagged as ghcr.io/kptdev/kpt:{{ .Tag }} 5.

CI Release Workflows#

Two GitHub Actions workflows manage releases:

• .github/workflows/release.yml — Triggered on tags matching v[1-9].*.*. Runs make all, then GoReleaser, and generates SLSA3 provenance for binaries.
• .github/workflows/release-api.yml — Triggered on tags matching api/v[0-9]+.[0-9]+.[0-9]+*. Runs make api against api/go.mod 6.

Hugo Documentation Version Injection#

Documentation at kpt.dev renders the current release version in multiple places (Docker pull commands, binary download links, etc.) using the Hugo shortcode {{< kpt_version >}}.

The shortcode documentation/layouts/shortcodes/kpt_version.html resolves the version in priority order:

1. Environment variable HUGO_KPT_VERSION — set at build time
2. Fallback: kpt_version site param in documentation/config.toml (currently "v1.0.0-beta.62.1")

The documentation/Makefile sets HUGO_KPT_VERSION dynamically using git describe --tags --abbrev=0 for both production-build and preview-build targets 7:

HUGO_KPT_VERSION=$$(git describe --tags --abbrev=0 2>/dev/null || true) hugo --minify

This means documentation builds automatically pick up the latest git tag without requiring manual edits to config.toml. The fallback value in config.toml is used for local serve builds 8 and acts as a default for PRs where no tag is present.

This versioning wiring was introduced in PR #4511.

Key Files#