Ansible-5.0.0 alpha1 ready for testing

[Toshio Kuratomi]

Hi all,

We're happy to announce that the Ansible 5.0.0 alpha1 package is now
available! This update is based on the ansible-core-2.12.x package
which is a major update from the one used by Ansible 4. Ansible 4 was
based on Ansible Core 2.11.x. There may be backwards incompatibilities
in the core playbook language. Please see the porting guide for
details.

This is an alpha release so we encourage people to use it to test that
their playbooks and workflows work with the upcoming major release and
report any bugs to the relevant bug trackers
(https://github.com/ansible/ansible/ for bugs in ansible-core and the
relevant collection for bugs in a collection's modules and plugins).


How to get it
-------------

Due to a limitation in pip, if you are upgrading from Ansible 3 (or
earlier), you need to uninstall Ansible and Ansible Base before
installing Ansible 5:

```
$ pip uninstall ansible ansible-base
$ pip install ansible==5.0.0a1 --user
```

The tar.gz of the release can be found here:

* Ansible 5.0.0a1:
https://pypi.python.org/packages/source/a/ansible/ansible-5.0.0a1.tar.gz

SHA256: d96c8db1fa61c18421c3775b3d24cd8c0ac48c85dc13b511a802c144626082a4

What's new in Ansible 5.0.0
---------------------------

* This version of Ansible is based on Ansible Core 2.12 which is a new
major update of the ansible-core package. It may contain backwards
incompatible changes to the playbook language and command line
programs. Please see the porting guide (linked at the bottom) for
more information.

* ansible-core-2.12 now requires Python 3.8 or greater on the
controller (where you run ansible-playbook). Managed nodes continue
to support Python 2.7 and Python 3.6 or greater unless noted otherwise
in a specific module's documentation.

* Collections which have opted into being a part of the Ansible 5.0.0
unified changelog will have an entry on this page:
* https://github.com/ansible-community/ansible-build-data/blob/main/5/CHANGELOG-v5.rst

* For collections which have not opted into the unified changelog,
consult the list of included collections in the link below and check
their entry on https://galaxy.ansible.com for information about their
changes.
* https://github.com/ansible-community/ansible-build-data/blob/main/5/ansible-5.0.0.deps

* You can find more information for those on
https://galaxy.ansible.com/. For instance, the community.crypto
collection listed in the ansible deps file has a galaxy page at
https://galaxy.ansible.com/community/crypto/

* The changelog for Ansible Core 2.12, which this release of ansible
installs, is located here:
https://github.com/ansible/ansible/blob/stable-2.12/changelogs/CHANGELOG-v2.12.rst


What's the schedule for new Ansible 5.0.0?
---------------------------------------------------------

* The Ansible-5 final release is expected on 2021-11-30. For the full
release schedule, including dates for other pre-releases, see the
roadmap page:
* https://docs.ansible.com/ansible/devel/roadmap/COLLECTIONS_5.html

* New minor releases will occur approximately every three weeks
(Ansible 5.1.0, Ansible 5.2.0, etc). They will contain bugfixes and
new features but no backwards incompatibilities.

* Once Ansible 5.0.0 final has been released, updates to Ansible 4 will stop.
* We've been putting together a document on issues that would need
to be addressed if someone would like to volunteer to create long term
updates: https://hackmd.io/plQlGzcFRFGLnPXIeg3cwQ


Porting Help
-------------

A unified porting guide for collections which have opted-in is
available here:
https://docs.ansible.com/ansible/devel/porting_guides/porting_guide_4.html

-Toshio