Read the Docs build failure and live version persistence limits

Documentation Versioning and Build Failures

Read the Docs employs a build-server architecture that triggers documentation generation via VCS webhooks. When a build is initiated, the system attempts to transform source files into static HTML using tools like Sphinx.

A critical behavior occurs when a new build fails: the platform typically maintains the previous successful version of the documentation as the live site to prevent total downtime. This creates a potential state where the hosted documentation does not reflect the current state of the version control branch.

There is uncertainty regarding the precise mechanism for reconciling this mismatch without triggering manual rebuilds for every versioned branch.

• How does the platform handle the synchronization of the 'latest' version tag when a build fails repeatedly?
• What are the constraints on automatically reverting the live site to a specific historical build rather than the most recent success?