edx/edx-platform — pull request #1704 by jimabramson (2013-11-18 22:51:32+00:00)
Title: merge 2013-11-15 hotfix branch to master

@nedbat @cpennington @ormsbee @feanil

Because of the rollback of release-2013-11-13 (after it was merged back to master), we created this special-purpose branch (release-hotfix-2013-11-15) to carry hotfixes to the post-rollback state of production.

We are merging directly back into master from this special-purpose branch, rather than using the release branch per the normal process. This is because everything on the release branch has already been merged to master, while everything on the special-purpose branch is based on an earlier state of the release branch.

Having worked through a few other scenarios using reverts or doing other long-handed things to the release branch, this seems to be the best because it is simple, doesn't lose any changes, and doesn't break the release process steps for the next person.

The only downside is that, until our next normal release cycle, the release branch will not match production - it will match the state of production that we ultimately discarded. (We still have the tag hotfix-2013-11-16 to point to the current state of prod, it will just never be on the branch named release.)

Please use the PR to raise any alarms or objections.