Blog

What You’ll Find Here

• Product Updates: New features and improvements to Merge Freeze
• Best Practices: Tips for managing deployments and merge freezes effectively
• Case Studies: How teams are using Merge Freeze to improve their workflows
• Technical Insights: Deep dives into deployment strategies and CI/CD practices

Stay Connected

Our blog will provide in-depth content and insights from the Merge Freeze team and our community.

We’re committed to helping teams deploy with confidence while maintaining the flexibility to freeze code merging when needed.

An important security enhancement to our API token system makes it easier to identify and manage your tokens while preparing for even more security improvements ahead.

What’s Changed

All newly created API tokens now use a friendlier, more secure syntax with clear prefixes:

Before

xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx

After

mfb_xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx # Branch tokens
mfo_xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx # Organization tokens

Enhanced Token Security

Better Token Management

The new prefixed format makes it immediately clear what type of token you’re working with:

One of the challenges in building robust integrations is handling edge cases gracefully. We’ve improved our GET branch endpoint to make programmatic repository management safer and more reliable.

The Challenge

When building automated systems that manage multiple repositories, you often encounter scenarios where:

• Repositories aren’t added to Merge Freeze (yet!)
• Repository names change or are deleted
• Projects are being dynamically created and managed via our API

Previously, trying to check the status of a non-existent repository would return an error, requiring additional error handling logic in your applications.

We’re thrilled to announce that GitHub Merge Queue support is now available in public beta! This has been one of our most requested features, and we’re excited to bring you this powerful integration that combines the best of both worlds: GitHub’s merge queue management and Merge Freeze’s deployment control.

What is GitHub Merge Queue?

GitHub’s Merge Queue is a powerful feature that helps maintain branch protection while ensuring your main branch stays in a good state. It works by:

Fine-grained deployment control is essential for modern DevOps workflows. Our Branch API now includes an enhancement that enables you to build smarter deployment scripts and automation workflows.

What’s New

Branch API responses now include the allow_deployments flag, enabling your DevOps scripts and CI/CD pipelines to make intelligent deployment decisions based on current permissions.

API Response Example

{
  "frozen": false,
  "allow_deployments": true,
  "branch": "main",
  "repository": "my-app",
  "timezone": "Eastern Time (US & Canada)",
  "next_freeze_at": "1666341060",
  "next_unfreeze_at": "1666341502"
}

Smart Deployment Control

Independent Control Settings

The allow_deployments flag operates independently from the frozen status, giving you nuanced control over your deployment pipeline:

Security and team coordination go hand in hand. Access Controls integrate with your GitHub repository permissions to give you control over who can manage your merge freezes.

Team Security at Scale

As teams scale, you need more than just the ability to freeze and unfreeze repositories. You need to ensure that:

• Only authorized team members can implement merge freezes
• API credentials are protected from unauthorized access
• Emergency procedures can be executed by the right people
• Audit trails show who made what changes and when

What’s New

Fine-Grained Permissions

Control exactly who can perform critical actions in your organization:

Not all projects are created equal. Some repositories handle sensitive data, require additional security measures, or are only accessible to specific team members. Slack private channels bring Merge Freeze’s powerful deployment controls to your most confidential projects.

Security and Compliance Benefits

Security-First Development

Some projects require an extra layer of confidentiality:

• Financial services applications handling transaction data
• Healthcare systems processing patient information
• Internal tools with privileged access
• Pre-announcement features that aren’t ready for public discussion

Compliance Requirements

Many industries require that deployment discussions happen in controlled environments with:

Mac users, this one’s for you! We’ve just released a major update to our Mac menu plugin that transforms how you interact with Merge Freeze directly from your desktop. Say hello to scheduler visibility and custom date formatting - two features that make managing deployments from your Mac more powerful than ever.

What’s New

📅 Upcoming Scheduler Events

Your Mac menu bar now shows upcoming freezes and unfreezes, giving you complete visibility into your deployment timeline without leaving your desktop.

Planning around scheduled freezes just got a whole lot easier! We’re excited to announce that our Branch API endpoints now include next_freeze_at and next_unfreeze_at epoch timestamps, giving you precise visibility into upcoming freeze events.

What’s New

Every Branch API response now includes two powerful new fields:

{
  "frozen": false,
  "allow_deployments": true,
  "branch": "main",
  "repository": "my-app",
  "organization": "my-org",
  "next_freeze_at": 1666310400,
  "next_unfreeze_at": 1666324800,
  "last_updated": "2022-10-20T10:00:00Z"
}

Understanding the Timestamps

• next_freeze_at: Unix epoch timestamp of the next scheduled freeze
• next_unfreeze_at: Unix epoch timestamp of the next scheduled unfreeze
• null values: Returned when no freeze/unfreeze is scheduled

Building Proactive Automation

Predictable Automation

Build smarter CI/CD pipelines that know exactly when freezes will occur:

Enterprise customers, this one’s for you! GitHub Invoiced customers can now manage their Merge Freeze subscriptions completely self-service through our new customer portal. No more waiting for support tickets or billing cycles - take control of your subscription instantly.

What’s New

Before vs After

Previously: Contact support → Wait 24-48 hours → Manual processing
Now: Login to portal → Make changes → Instant activation ✅

Self-Service Capabilities

• ➕ Add/remove repositories instantly
• 💳 Update payment methods and billing information
• 📈 Scale up or down based on current needs

Getting Started

Where to Find It

To access the new self-service portal, follow these steps:

Communication is key to successful deployment management. Slack notifications for scheduled freezes keep your entire team in the loop when Merge Freeze automations kick in.

Proactive Team Communication

The Challenge

Before this feature, scheduled freezes happened silently:

• ❓ Team confusion: “Why can’t I merge? Is the system broken?”
• 🕐 Timing surprises: “I didn’t know the freeze was starting now”
• 📞 Unnecessary escalations: Support tickets for expected behavior
• 🤔 Context missing: “How long will this freeze last?”

The Solution

Clear communication:

We’re excited to announce the Freeze Logs API - giving you programmatic access to comprehensive freeze operation logs for analytics, compliance reporting, and integration with your monitoring systems.

What’s New

The new API endpoint provides detailed logs of all freeze operations:

curl "https://www.mergefreeze.com/api/freeze_logs" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer your_api_token" \
  -G \
  -d "project_name=your-repo"

What you get:

• 📊 Complete freeze history with timestamps and duration
• 📝 Reason tracking - why each freeze was created
• 🔄 Operation details - freeze/unfreeze events with context
• 🏷️ Metadata - branch, repository, and organizational context

Response Format

{
  "freeze_logs": [
    {
      "id": 12345,
      "frozen": true,
      "frozen_by": "user@example.com",
      "reason": "Emergency maintenance",
      "created_at": "2022-09-20T10:30:00Z",
      "unfrozen_at": null
    }
  ]
}

Common Use Cases

Compliance Reporting

Generate audit reports showing all deployment controls with timestamps, users, and justifications for compliance reviews.

Mac developers, this one’s for you! We’re thrilled to introduce the Merge Freeze Mac Menu Plugin - bringing the power of deployment control directly to your desktop. No more switching between browser tabs or remembering URLs - manage your freezes with a simple click from your Mac’s menu bar.

Why a Native Mac App?

Developer Workflow Integration

Mac developers live in their menu bar - it’s the fastest way to access frequently used tools:

Infrastructure automation just got a major upgrade! We’re excited to announce the ability to schedule upcoming freezes (and their accompanying unfreezes) directly via our API. Now you can programmatically plan deployment windows, maintenance schedules, and release coordination with the same precision you use for the rest of your infrastructure.

What’s New

Create scheduled freezes with a simple API call:

curl -X POST "https://www.mergefreeze.com/api/scheduled_freezes" \
  -d "access_token=your_api_token" \
  -d "account=your-org" \
  -d "repository=your-repo" \
  -d "branch=main" \
  -d "one_off_freeze_at=1672531200" \
  -d "one_off_unfreeze_at=1672542000"

Key capabilities:

Maintenance windows and emergency responses just got more efficient! We’re excited to introduce batch unfreeze - the ability to unfreeze multiple projects simultaneously. Perfect for completing maintenance windows, ending incident responses, and coordinating the return to normal operations.

How It Works

Simple Unfreezing Process

1. Select frozen repositories using checkboxes next to each project
2. Click “Unfreeze” to unfreeze all selected repositories

Key Benefits

• Complete maintenance faster: Unfreeze multiple projects quickly
• Reduce coordination errors: All repositories return to normal operation together
• Perfect for planned windows: Ideal for ending scheduled maintenance periods

Common Use Cases

Maintenance Window Completion

After completing database migrations, infrastructure updates, or planned maintenance, quickly restore all affected services to normal operation.

Transparency builds trust, especially for mission-critical deployment tools. Status Page 2.0 completely redesigns our service health monitoring, giving you unprecedented visibility into Merge Freeze’s operational status.

What’s New

Granular Service Monitoring

Instead of a single “everything is working” indicator, you now get detailed insights into every component:

• API Gateway: Request processing and response times
• Authentication: Login and token validation systems
• Freeze Operations: Core freeze/unfreeze functionality
• Webhook Delivery: GitHub and Slack integrations
• Dashboard UI: Web interface availability

Real-Time Status Updates

• Current operational status for each service component
• Response time metrics showing system performance
• Uptime percentages over the last 30 days
• Active incident tracking with real-time updates

Historical Performance Data

• 30-day uptime summaries for all major components
• Response time trends showing performance over time
• Incident history with detailed timelines and resolutions
• Maintenance schedules for planned service updates

Enhanced Incident Management

Transparent Communication

When issues occur, you’ll see:

Deployment control just became more developer-friendly! We’re excited to introduce PR search by name - the ability to find and unfreeze pull requests using descriptive titles instead of memorizing numbers. Now you can think in terms of the actual changes you want to deploy.

What’s New

Search PRs by Description

Instead of remembering “PR #1847”, you can now search for:

• “fix login bug”
• “payment integration”
• “user dashboard update”
• “database migration”

Smart Search Features

• Partial matching: Search for “login” to find “Fix login validation bug”
• Case insensitive: “LOGIN” and “login” both work
• Multiple keywords: “user profile update” matches relevant PRs
• Instant results: Search updates as you type

How It Works

1. Start typing in the PR search box
2. See matching results appear instantly
3. Click to select the PR you want to unfreeze
4. Confirm unfreezing - back to normal deployment

Finding and unfreezing PRs should be as natural as thinking about the change you want to deploy. Welcome to developer-friendly deployment control! 🚀✨

Update: Batch freeze has been updated and integrated into the new UI of the Merge Freeze dashboard, making it easier than ever to manage multiple repositories at once.

Coordinating freezes across multiple repositories just became effortless! Batch freeze lets you select and freeze multiple projects simultaneously. Perfect for maintenance windows, coordinated releases, and emergency response scenarios where you need to lock down multiple services at once.

Comprehensive audit trails are essential for enterprise deployment management. Today, we’re excited to announce that formerly executed one-off freezes are now visible in the Scheduler interface - giving you complete historical visibility for compliance, analysis, and correlation with your internal systems.

What Changed

Before: Limited Historical Visibility

One-off freezes were executed and then disappeared from view:

❌ Previous Behavior:
├── Execute one-off freeze via API or manual action
├── Freeze runs and completes successfully  
├── No record visible in Scheduler interface
├── Difficult to correlate with internal logs
└── Limited audit trail for compliance

Challenges:
├── "Did we freeze payment-processor last Tuesday?"
├── No easy way to verify freeze timing
├── Compliance audits required manual log correlation
└── Incident post-mortems lacked freeze context

After: Complete Historical Record

All freeze operations now maintain visible history: