Release Gate

Use this before staging or production release.

Workflow

1. Confirm the reviewed commit or artifact being released.
2. Confirm environment and deployment mechanism.
3. Run the smallest deployment validation available.
4. Smoke-test the critical route or workflow.
5. Record rollback path.
6. Create a HITL issue if deployment needs missing human-held access.

Scope & Exemption Rules

Apply this gate selectively based on risk level to prevent release gridlock:

• Exempt (Skip this gate): Low-risk changes per AI_ENGINEERING_WORKFLOW.md (documentation-only edits, comments, minor styling/CSS tweaks, test-only additions, and narrow bug fixes with no business-rule change, data schema, auth, or infrastructure changes) skip the full staging/rollback release gate.
• Mandatory (Do not skip): Medium and High-risk changes (user-facing features, business logic changes, migrations, authentication/permissions, deployment pipelines, and third-party integrations) must satisfy all checks below before release.