Practice hotfix vocabulary: cutting a hotfix, bypassing normal release process, cherry-picking to release branches, deployment timelines, and hotfix decision-making language.
0 / 5 completed
1 / 5
'We're _____ a hotfix for the critical bug.' What verb describes creating an emergency release?
'Cutting a hotfix' is the standard engineering idiom for creating an emergency fix release, derived from 'cutting a release' meaning to prepare a specific version for deployment.
2 / 5
'The hotfix _____ the normal release process.' Why is a hotfix treated differently?
A hotfix bypasses the normal release process (scheduled windows, full QA cycle, change management) because the severity of the bug requires faster deployment than the standard process allows.
3 / 5
'Hotfix PR is _____ from main to release/1.2.' What git operation applies a specific commit to another branch?
'Cherry-picked' applies a specific commit from one branch (main) to another (release/1.2) without merging the entire branch history — the standard way to apply hotfixes to release branches.
4 / 5
'The hotfix is deployed within _____ hours of the incident.' What is the typical hotfix SLA?
2 hours is the example given. Hotfix SLAs vary by severity, but critical production issues typically target deployment within 1-4 hours to minimize customer impact.
5 / 5
When deciding whether to cut a hotfix, the primary question is:
The hotfix decision pivots on severity justification — only bugs with significant customer impact (data loss, security, complete outage) warrant bypassing the normal, safer release process.