chore(release): alternative folded 1.16.0 candidate

[jxnl]

Purpose

This is the approved folded release candidate for 1.16.0 against current main. Jason chose on 2026-08-09 to skip standalone 1.15.5 publication and fold that unpublished payload into 1.16.0.

Integration PR #2517 is now merged at ad95a3d4. Against that exact main tree, this PR contains only six release files: version source, runtime version, lock metadata, release validator and tests, and the audited changelog.

This PR does not publish, tag, release, deploy to PyPI, or post social copy.

Included

• Version source, lock metadata, and runtime instructor.__version__ set to 1.16.0.
• Release validator checks the runtime version using AST in addition to source, lockfile, changelog, tag, and artifacts.
• Changelog contains the complete unpublished 1.15.5 payload plus the scoped 1.16 work under one 1.16.0 heading dated 2026-08-09.
• Canonical PRs fix(validation): isolate llm validator prompt data #2511-docs(contributing): align setup with uv workflow #2516 and their source issues/PRs are attributed in the relevant entries.
• Contributor workflow documentation is represented explicitly.
• Compare link is v1.15.4...v1.16.0.

Validation

Validated at 8a43993e576cb3f59432bcef4aadf8e4ba90f06a:

• uv lock --check
• release validator for expected 1.16.0
• 8 release-validator tests
• full pre-commit suite: Ruff, format, lock, dependency install, requirements export, and ty
• wheel and sdist build plus Twine 6.2.0 checks
• clean Python 3.9 and 3.13 wheel installs
• distribution metadata, runtime version, generated schema, and Pydantic validation smoke checks
• changelog audit against v1.15.4..HEAD: complete scope, no standalone 1.15.5 boundary, canonical attribution, current candidate date, and correct compare links
• Test workflow: full coverage, core, Python 3.9-3.13, core-provider groups, Auto Client, and all configured providers passed
• Release Readiness: metadata, release checks, build, Twine, artifact upload, and Python 3.9/3.13 wheel smokes passed; publication was skipped

Related

• Merged integration: chore(release): verify integrated 1.16 queue #2517
• Closed publish-first alternative: chore(release): prepare 1.16.0 candidate #2518

---

Note

Low Risk
Metadata-only release candidate: version bumps, changelog reorganization, and stricter pre-publish checks with no runtime library behavior changes in this diff.

Overview
This PR bumps the package to 1.16.0 across pyproject.toml, instructor.__version__, and uv.lock, and folds the unpublished 1.15.5 changelog into a single dated 1.16.0 section (2026-08-09) with compare links v1.15.4...v1.16.0.

Release tooling now parses instructor/__init__.py with AST and fails if __version__ drifts from the project version or is missing, with matching tests in the release-validator fixture.

^{Reviewed by Cursor Bugbot for commit 8a43993. Configure here.}

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Status	Name	Latest Commit	Preview URL	Updated (UTC)
✅ Deployment successful! View logs	instructor	8a43993	Commit Preview URL Branch Preview URL	Aug 09 2026, 02:49 PM