fix: use detached tag approach for versioned releases

Tag points to a commit NOT in main's history:
- release-it handles changelog only (no tag, no push)
- Push changelog to main
- Create separate commit with embedded version
- Tag that commit and push only the tag
- Archive tarball from tag has embedded version
- main always has __VERSION__ placeholder

Co-Authored-By: Claude Code (User Settings, in: ${CLAUDE_PROJECT_DIR}) <noreply@anthropic.com>

Author: nsheaps

.github/workflows/release.yaml

@@ -52,18 +52,11 @@ jobs:
             echo "tag=v$VERSION" >> "$GITHUB_OUTPUT"
           fi
 
-      - name: Embed version in script
-        if: steps.next-version.outputs.will-release == 'true'
-        run: |
-          # Embed version before release-it commits, so the tagged commit has it
-          sed -i -E 's/GIT_WT_VERSION="(__VERSION__|v[0-9]+\.[0-9]+\.[0-9]+)"/GIT_WT_VERSION="${{ steps.next-version.outputs.tag }}"/' bin/git-wt
-
-      - name: Run release-it
+      - name: Run release-it for changelog
         id: release
         if: steps.next-version.outputs.will-release == 'true'
         run: |
-          # Run release-it to bump version, update changelog, commit, and tag
-          # The embedded version will be included in the tagged commit
+          # release-it updates changelog and commits (no tag, no push)
           if yarn release-it --ci; then
             echo "released=true" >> "$GITHUB_OUTPUT"
             echo "version=${{ steps.next-version.outputs.version }}" >> "$GITHUB_OUTPUT"
@@ -73,14 +66,48 @@ jobs:
             echo "released=false" >> "$GITHUB_OUTPUT"
           fi
 
-      - name: Reset version to placeholder
+      - name: Push changelog to main
+        if: steps.release.outputs.released == 'true'
+        run: git push origin main
+
+      - name: Create tagged release commit
         if: steps.release.outputs.released == 'true'
         run: |
-          # Reset to __VERSION__ so main branch stays clean
-          sed -i -E 's/GIT_WT_VERSION="v[0-9]+\.[0-9]+\.[0-9]+"/GIT_WT_VERSION="__VERSION__"/' bin/git-wt
+          TAG="${{ steps.release.outputs.tag }}"
+
+          # Embed version in script
+          sed -i -E 's/GIT_WT_VERSION="(__VERSION__|v[0-9]+\.[0-9]+\.[0-9]+)"/GIT_WT_VERSION="'"$TAG"'"/' bin/git-wt
+
+          # Commit with embedded version (this commit will NOT be on main)
           git add bin/git-wt
-          git commit -m "chore: reset version placeholder [skip ci]"
-          git push
+          git commit -m "release: $TAG"
+
+          # Tag this commit
+          git tag -a "$TAG" -m "Release $TAG"
+
+          # Push ONLY the tag (the commit stays detached from main)
+          git push origin "$TAG"
+
+          # Reset local main back to before the embedded version commit
+          # This leaves main clean with __VERSION__
+          git reset --hard HEAD~1
+
+      - name: Create GitHub release
+        if: steps.release.outputs.released == 'true'
+        run: |
+          TAG="${{ steps.release.outputs.tag }}"
+
+          # Checkout the tagged commit to get bin/git-wt with embedded version
+          git checkout "$TAG" -- bin/git-wt
+
+          # Create release with the versioned script as asset
+          gh release create "$TAG" \
+            bin/git-wt \
+            --title "$TAG" \
+            --generate-notes
+
+          # Restore bin/git-wt to __VERSION__ (from main)
+          git checkout HEAD -- bin/git-wt
 
   update-homebrew:
     if: needs.release.outputs.released == 'true'

.release-it.json

@@ -1,18 +1,14 @@
 {
-  "hooks": {
-    "before:git:commit": "git reset HEAD bin/git-wt"
-  },
   "git": {
+    "commit": true,
     "commitMessage": "chore: release v${version} [skip ci]",
-    "tagName": "v${version}",
-    "tagAnnotation": "Release v${version}",
+    "tag": false,
+    "push": false,
     "requireCleanWorkingDir": false,
     "getLatestTagFromAllRefs": true
   },
   "github": {
-    "release": true,
-    "autoGenerate": true,
-    "assets": ["bin/git-wt"]
+    "release": false
   },
   "npm": false,
   "plugins": {