Recommended Practice During Release?

### New feature, improvement proposal

I am using changes.xml file in my project. Developer writes the entry
himself and it is expected to be part of the commit.
Is this recommended practice or is it more common to extract Change Log
from Git or from Jira tickets?

I would like to combine the usage of changes.xml with a release:
when *maven-release-plugin:prepare* creates the release commits, I would
like it to automatically close the corresponding release entry in
changes.xml and change the release date to the current date, if not
already. And after this, before committing the new development
(-SNAPSHOT) version commit, to open the corresponding release entry in
changes.xml file.

Would it make sense to add this kind of functionality to maven-changes-plugin?

Start by reviewing how maven-changes-plugin handles changes.xml and how maven-release-plugin:prepare creates release and development-version commits. Determine whether the requested release-entry closing, date update, and reopening fit this plugin's scope or require coordination with the release plugin. Done means a documented, agreed design and implementation path for automating those changes.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.