[Feature]: easier distribution for pre-release versions of mods

[JonnyOThan]

Motivation

I often put out a pre-release version of mods like RasterPropMonitor and FreeIva and have people alpha-test them for a bit to screen for any new bugs before pushing a wider distribution. These currently always have to be manually installed since CKAN doesn't pick them up. It would be nice to make that process a little more streamlined.

Suggestions

I'd like to explore a way for mod developers to be able to publish pre-release versions of their mods and have users opt-in to receiving them.

I think in the past this has been done by adding metadata repos (for kopernicus?). This works but feels pretty clunky - and requires a lot of extra work on behalf of the modder to set up.

There are two components that I'd like to see in some kind of system:

• a way for modders to mark releases as "pre-release" vs "stable"
• a way for CKAN users to opt-in to getting pre-release versions of mods, either:
  • manually from the mod's versions tab
  • on an opt-in basis per mod (e.g. as a label)
  • globally (worst option, but I'd take it if the above aren't possible)

The modder's side of this sort of already exists, at least on github: releases can be marked as pre-release and ckan does not index these. There is a release_status field in the .ckan metadata - is this actually used for anything currently? As a weak proposal, what if we indexed github prereleases and set their release_status field? And then the decision to update or not would be on the client side.

[JonnyOThan]

Sure. Specifically I often put out a pre-release version of mods like RasterPropMonitor and FreeIva and have people alpha-test them for a bit to screen for any new bugs before pushing a wider distribution. These currently always have to be manually installed since CKAN doesn't pick them up. It would be nice to make that process a little more streamlined.