Gate release tag creation

[yzm1]

Summary

• add a repository-enforced release/vX.Y.Z initiation gate
• require the release branch to point at current main and match pyproject.toml
• create or validate the immutable version tag
• explicitly dispatch publication with the exact tag and 40-character commit SHA
• make the publish workflow revalidate tag/SHA/version identity before rebuilding and publishing

Why

Tags created by the repository GITHUB_TOKEN do not trigger ordinary push workflows. GitHub explicitly permits workflow_dispatch as the recursion-safe exception, so the gate dispatches publish.yml directly with pinned inputs.

Verification

• YAML parsing and whitespace checks pass
• branch/version validation tested with release/v0.10.0
• bounded release audit: PASS for permissions, recursion behavior, checkout target, tag/SHA validation, PyPI sequencing, stable-tag update, and GitHub Release creation
• prior release PR and post-merge main runs are fully green on Python 3.9–3.14 for Linux/Windows, build/install smoke, and hostile-input Action contract

[chatgpt-codex-connector]

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[chatgpt-codex-connector]

Recheck the main-commit invariant before publishing

When a repository writer directly invokes workflow_dispatch or pushes a matching version tag, this check accepts any tag/SHA whose checked-out package version matches, even if that commit would fail the new release branch's current-main check. gh workflow run --help confirms that --ref main only selects the ref containing the workflow file; it does not constrain release_sha to main. Consequently, publication can still bypass the claimed release gate, so this workflow should independently compare the supplied SHA with current main or otherwise verify that the gated workflow authorized it.

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