diff --git a/CHANGES.txt b/CHANGES.txt
index 192b3c915..aaf2da7b3 100644
--- a/CHANGES.txt
+++ b/CHANGES.txt
@@ -3,6 +3,16 @@ Change history for Coverage.py
 ------------------------------
 
 
+Version 4.0a4 --- 25 January 2015
+---------------------------------
+
+- Plugins can now provide sys_info for debugging output.
+
+- Started plugins documentation.
+
+- Prepared to move the docs to readthedocs.org.
+
+
 Version 4.0a3 --- 20 January 2015
 ---------------------------------
 
@@ -45,6 +55,8 @@ Version 4.0a2 --- 14 January 2015
   It will probably still work on older versions of PyPy, but I'm not testing
   against them.
 
+- Plugins!
+
 - The original command line switches (`-x` to run a program, etc) are no
   longer supported.
 
diff --git a/doc/changes.rst b/doc/changes.rst
index 1b2693f1c..c85bbffea 100644
--- a/doc/changes.rst
+++ b/doc/changes.rst
@@ -37,8 +37,8 @@ history, see the `CHANGES.txt`_ file in the source tree.
 
 .. _changes_40:
 
-Version 4.0a4 pre-release --- ??? 2015
---------------------------------------
+Version 4.0a4 pre-release --- 25 January 2015
+---------------------------------------------
 
 Backward incompatibilities:
 
diff --git a/doc/index.rst b/doc/index.rst
index e4ea71f36..637077c67 100644
--- a/doc/index.rst
+++ b/doc/index.rst
@@ -50,7 +50,7 @@ not.
 
 .. ifconfig:: prerelease
 
-    The latest version is coverage.py 4.0a4, released 27 September 2014.
+    The latest version is coverage.py 4.0a4, released 25 January 2015.
     It is supported on Python versions 2.6 through 3.4, PyPy 2.2 through 2.4,
     and PyPy3 2.3 and 2.4.
     **This is a pre-release build.  The usual warnings about possible bugs apply.**
@@ -105,8 +105,8 @@ Getting started is easy:
         `report like this one`_.
 
 .. _coverage page on the Python Package Index: http://pypi.python.org/pypi/coverage
-.. _report like this: /code/coverage/sample_html/index.html
-.. _report like this one: /code/coverage/sample_html_beta/index.html
+.. _report like this: http://nedbatchelder.com/code/coverage/sample_html/index.html
+.. _report like this one: http://nedbatchelder.com/code/coverage/sample_html_beta/index.html
 
 
 Using coverage.py
diff --git a/doc/install.rst b/doc/install.rst
index 1ab29e3f0..be71cb005 100644
--- a/doc/install.rst
+++ b/doc/install.rst
@@ -82,9 +82,9 @@ If all went well, you should be able to open a command prompt, and see coverage
 installed properly::
 
     $ coverage --version
-    Coverage.py, version 4.0a1.  http://nedbatchelder.com/code/coverage
+    Coverage.py, version 4.0a4.  http://nedbatchelder.com/code/coverage
 
 You can also invoke coverage as a module::
 
     $ python -m coverage --version
-    Coverage.py, version 4.0a1.  http://nedbatchelder.com/code/coverage
+    Coverage.py, version 4.0a4.  http://nedbatchelder.com/code/coverage
diff --git a/howto.txt b/howto.txt
index d8bf2cf95..247ffe2ab 100644
--- a/howto.txt
+++ b/howto.txt
@@ -17,10 +17,11 @@
     - Version --version output in doc/install.rst
     - Don't forget the man page: doc/python-coverage.1.txt
     - Generate new sample_html to get the latest, incl footer version number:
-        python setup.py develop
+        pip install -e .
         cd ~/cog/trunk
         rm -rf htmlcov
-        coverage run --branch --source=cogapp -m cogapp.test_cogapp CogTestsInMemory
+        TODO: this isn't right with the new cog
+            coverage run --branch --source=cogapp -m cogapp.test_cogapp CogTestsInMemory
         coverage html
         - IF BETA:
             cp -r htmlcov/ ~/coverage/trunk/doc/sample_html_beta/