Backport: Document the release process

* admin/notes/versioning: Add information about RC releases.
* admin/release-process: Document the release process.
* admin/authors.el (authors-ignored-files):
* admin/README: Change FOR-RELEASE to release-process.
* CONTRIBUTE:
* admin/notes/bugtracker: Don't mention FOR-RELEASE.

(cherry picked from commit 9a4aa0f5945a03611ae29c516025dbd353bd26ab)

2 files changed, 9 insertions, 6 deletions

diff --git a/admin/notes/bugtracker b/admin/notes/bugtracker
index fb65bbe4330..3d6df03d5e7 100644
--- a/admin/notes/bugtracker
+++ b/admin/notes/bugtracker
@@ -140,8 +140,7 @@ you can add an element to gnus-posting-styles to do this automatically, eg:
 
 ** To record a bug in the tracker without sending mail to the bug list.
 This can be useful to make a note of something discussed on
-emacs-devel that needs fixing.  In other words, this can be the
-equivalent of adding something to FOR-RELEASE.
+emacs-devel that needs fixing.
 
 To: quiet@debbugs.gnu.org
 [headers end]
diff --git a/admin/notes/versioning b/admin/notes/versioning
index e422b22e432..ef11335de54 100644
--- a/admin/notes/versioning
+++ b/admin/notes/versioning
@@ -9,16 +9,20 @@ Emacs version numbers have the form
 "build" increments each time Emacs is built in the same location
 (without cleaning) and isn't really part of the version.
 
-bugfix releases increase "minor" by 1.
-non-bugfix releases increase "major" by 1, and reset "minor" to 1.
+Bugfix releases increase "minor" by 1.
+Non-bugfix releases increase "major" by 1, and reset "minor" to 1.
 (The division between bugfix and non-bugfix has not always been clear
 historically.)
 
 Unreleased (development) versions have an extra "devel" component.
 This is a fairly meaningless number that may be unchanged for a long time.
 It is normally 50.
-When the release process starts, it changes to 90, 91, ...
-When the actual release is made, this component is removed.
+
+After we cut the release branch, we’ll make pretest and release
+candidate (RC) releases.  For pretest releases, the "devel" component
+changes to 90, 91, ...  When the first RC release is made, this
+component is removed.  Normally, there is one RC release, unless an
+unexpected last-minute problem occurs.
 
 The development version for a new major release has "minor" = 0.
 The development version for a new minor release has "minor" = that of