Workflow: Release Checklist

# Release Checklist (Web Apps)

## Before merge to main
- Ensure CI is green (lint, typecheck, unit tests).
- Add/verify integration/E2E tests for critical user flows.
- Confirm feature flags for risky changes.

## Before deploy
- Confirm environment variables exist in target environment.
- Confirm database migrations are safe and reversible.
- Verify backward compatibility for API changes.
- Build artifacts from a clean environment.

## Deploy
- Prefer canary or staged rollout.
- Monitor error rate, latency, saturation immediately.
- Verify health checks and key smoke tests.

## After deploy
- Run smoke tests: auth, core flows, payments (if any).
- Verify background jobs/queues are processing.
- Check logs for new warnings and spikes.
- Confirm dashboards + alerts are active.

## Rollback plan
- Know how to rollback the app version.
- Know how to rollback migrations (or how to forward-fix).
- Have a comms plan for incidents.

## Documentation
- Update CHANGELOG and runbook.
- Tag the release in git.
- Capture any manual steps for next time.