Gitflow - Create branches from release branch

[Javid Alimohideen]

Hello,

In our team we are trying to adopt the gitflow workflow and running into a situation where we are unable to create a branch from release branch. We have a develop branch and created a release branch that branched off from develop. Now, we have few team members working on new features which are getting merged to develop. The QA found an issue with release branch and we wanted to create a new branch from release branch to make the fix and create a PR to merge from the fix branch to release branch. 

In sourcetree, when we choose gitflow there is no option to "Create New feature", just "Finish release".

We are not allowing direct commits to develop or release branches and trying to manage using PR requests. This is done so we can avoid any breaking code from getting committed.

How can one create a branch from a release branch? Is this even possible?

I would also like to hear how other teams are using gitflow to get changes into the release branch

[Mikael Sandberg · Accepted solution]

Hi Javid,

Welcome to the Atlassian Community.

The Git Flow workflow defines that feature branches are created from your develop branch, and that is why when you are trying to use it to create a new feature branch from a release branch that option is not there. This does not mean that you cannot create a feature branch off of a release branch. the only thing it means is that you would have to use other ways of doing it.

You can create the branch either locally by making sure your repository is currently selecting the release branch, then click on Branch and name your feature branch (add feature/ before the actual branch name to mark it as a feature branch). You can now make your changes and push it back to Bitbucket. You can also create the feature branch from within Bitbucket. 

[Javid Alimohideen]

Thanks Mikael.

I missed the option that we can use "Branch" option to create a regular branch.