We discussed in the P4 API WG meeting that it would be a good time to cut a new release. Opening this as an umbrella bug to track that.

• label open PRs and issues with https://github.com/p4lang/p4runtime/labels/1.4.0 if they should block the release.
  • ideally include all PRs/issue with p4-language-compatibility An issue related to compatibility between P4_16 language spec and P4Runtime API spec label
• close all PRs/issue with label https://github.com/p4lang/p4runtime/labels/1.4.0
• make sure the changelog entry in the spec is up to date. #491
• Update the Bazel example to use the new release
  • Merge Update Bazel example to point to 1.4.0 #493
• All references in the P4Runtime spec should then be updated to point to the latest released version of the P4 language spec.
• Update references to the "latest" P4Runtime version in documentation.
• Add comments "{Changed,Deprecated} in 1.4.0" to all protobuf changes - PR 490
• Update p4.org spec page links (Andy)
• After publishing the release on Github, make sure that the PyPi package was uploaded successfully. This happens automatically from Github CI. There will be a CI error if it fails.
• Update the version string in the spec .mdk source document. After the release, the version string should be set to 1.5.0-dev on the main branch.
• Added - Change P4RT spec version to 1.4.1, 1.4.0 tag was "consumed"
• Added - Update the Bazel example to use the new release (final step to avoid tag cyclic dependency)

...

@antoninbas do you have any notes/suggestion on the process you have used in the past?

cc @chrispsommers @jonathan-dilorenzo @jafingerhut

EDIT: The cutoff date for changes going into 1.4.0 is September 13, the date of our next P4 API working group meeting.