META: Make it easier to discover unreleased modules

[stpaultim]

This is a known problem and I would assume we have existing issues open for it already, but I was unable to find any in my brief search.

The problem is that many people are NOT aware of the many unreleased modules available in GITHUB that are not on BackdropCMS.org, because they do not have official releases.

This is good, because unreleased modules can be very buggy and dangerous.
This is bad, becuase many of the unreleased modules are quite usable and folks evaluating BackdropCMS.org, might be discouraged because the module they need is not on backdropcms.org, unaware of the fact that there may be a usable or near usable version of the modules on github.

See this comment: backdrop-ops/contrib#877

I'll try to do some work soon to find related open issues and post some issues for specific suggestions on how we might deal with this issue.

I do not think there is a single answer to this problem, but a number of smaller things we could do to improve the situation.

[swampopus]

Hello-- I totally understand why "alpha", "dev", and "beta" releases don't show up on the Install modules screen, but my suggestion (which I think is the easiest solution for now is to simply add some text to that screen with a link to the github contrib repository list. See my attached image for an example:

I'd also suggest similar wording on the backdropcms.org website itself, for those who search for modules through the website alone.

Of course the wording could be cleaned up a little, but the idea is to at least let new devs know that there are more projects out there, in various stages of development. I've personally found completely functional and working modules this way that did NOT have an official 1x-1.0.0 release, but were otherwise production-ready. I left issues on a couple of them asking for an official release, but as some of them are years old, I think the devs have moved on to other things.

[indigoxela]

@swampopus I belief, that's a great idea! And not too hard to do, either.

Alpha and beta releases do show up, BTW. Only totally unreleased projects (or marked on GH as "pre-release", which isn't the same as alpha/beta/rc) wont.

[izmeez]

I have added an issue with a PR in the backdrop core issue queue. I would appreciate comments. Thanks.