[v7.1.0-preview3] Release Notes

[priyankatiwari08]

Adds the release notes for the 7.1.0-preview3 release. Version and SNI updates are handled separately in #4564.

Fixes AB#47354

Changes

New release notes

File	Contents
release-notes/7.1/7.1.0-preview3.md	Core Microsoft.Data.SqlClient notes
release-notes/Extensions/Azure/7.1/7.1.0-preview3.md	Obsolete Azure.Identity API removal (#4421)
release-notes/Extensions/Abstractions/7.1/7.1.0-preview3.md	Version alignment only
release-notes/Internal/Logging/7.1/7.1.0-preview3.md	Version alignment only
release-notes/add-ons/AzureKeyVaultProvider/7.1/7.1.0-preview3.md	Version alignment only

Updated

• The five 7.1/README.md index tables, each with a 7.1.0-preview3 row.
• CHANGELOG.md, with a new top entry mirroring the core notes.

Notes for reviewers

• Release date is a placeholder. All files currently say 2026-08-26 (the milestone due date). This needs to be corrected to the actual ship date before merge.
• Coverage is the 61 PRs merged into the milestone so far. Any PRs that merge into the 7.1.0-preview3 milestone after this PR opens will be added in a follow-up commit here before merge.
• Customer-facing PRs only. Engineering, test-only, pipeline/benchmark, and localization PRs are excluded, consistent with prior releases.
• Per-TFM dependency lists were taken from Microsoft.Data.SqlClient.nuspec on main, and reflect the 9.0.18 bump for net9.0 (Update central package versions #4507), the new System.Threading.RateLimiting dependency, and the SNI 7.1.0-preview3.26226.3 bump from [v7.1.0-preview3] Update SNI package reference to 7.1.0-preview3 #4564.

Checklist

• Public API changes documented
• Companion package notes added for all four aligned packages
• CHANGELOG.md and README index tables updated
• Release date confirmed
• Notes regenerated after remaining milestone PRs merge

[Copilot]

Pull request overview

Adds the draft release notes set for the 7.1.0-preview3 release across the core Microsoft.Data.SqlClient package and the aligned companion packages, and updates the release-note indexes and CHANGELOG.md to include the new preview entry.

Changes:

• Added 7.1.0-preview3 release note documents for the core driver and aligned companion packages.
• Updated the 7.1/README.md index tables to include a 7.1.0-preview3 row.
• Added a new top entry to CHANGELOG.md mirroring the core release notes summary.

Reviewed changes

Copilot reviewed 11 out of 11 changed files in this pull request and generated no comments.

Show a summary per file

File	Description
release-notes/7.1/7.1.0-preview3.md	Adds the core driver release notes for 7.1.0-preview3, including feature/bugfix summaries and dependency tables.
release-notes/7.1/README.md	Adds 7.1.0-preview3 to the core 7.1 index table.
release-notes/Extensions/Azure/7.1/7.1.0-preview3.md	Adds companion package notes for Extensions.Azure (including the obsolete Azure.Identity API removal reference).
release-notes/Extensions/Azure/7.1/README.md	Adds 7.1.0-preview3 to the Extensions.Azure 7.1 index table.
release-notes/Extensions/Abstractions/7.1/7.1.0-preview3.md	Adds companion package notes for Extensions.Abstractions (version alignment only).
release-notes/Extensions/Abstractions/7.1/README.md	Adds 7.1.0-preview3 to the Extensions.Abstractions 7.1 index table.
release-notes/Internal/Logging/7.1/7.1.0-preview3.md	Adds companion package notes for Internal.Logging (version alignment only).
release-notes/Internal/Logging/7.1/README.md	Adds 7.1.0-preview3 to the Internal.Logging 7.1 index table.
release-notes/add-ons/AzureKeyVaultProvider/7.1/7.1.0-preview3.md	Adds companion package notes for AzureKeyVaultProvider (version alignment only).
release-notes/add-ons/AzureKeyVaultProvider/7.1/README.md	Adds 7.1.0-preview3 to the AzureKeyVaultProvider 7.1 index table.
CHANGELOG.md	Adds a new top-level changelog entry for 7.1.0-preview3 aligned with the core release notes.

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