feat(release): publish preview releases from an unmerged branch

[Jacksondr5]

Problem

J5 Release only published a stable version and always marked it as the latest release. A change to installing or updating couldn't be tested end to end until it had merged and shipped to everyone; the j5 CLI stack (#414–#418) can't exercise an in-app server update across the executable rename before 0.0.48 is out. Closes #437.

What changed

The preview channel already exists in the code J5 inherited (the version pattern, T3CODE_CHANNEL=preview, j5 update --channel preview, desktop preview builds with no update feed). This PR adds the missing piece, publishing one:

• Version rule: J5 Release accepts <x.y.z>-preview.<yyyymmdd>.<n> as well as a stable version. Nightly and other pre-release shapes are still refused.
• Never latest: a preview is published as a GitHub pre-release and explicitly not latest, so the stable installer URL, j5 update and desktop updates ignore it. It's installed only by naming the version.
• No update metadata: a preview desktop build has no update feed, so the workflow expects no latest-mac.yml for it instead of requiring one.
• Release notes: a preview's notes say what it is and give the commands that name its version, including the installer attached to that release (the one under test).
• Runbook: docs/j5/runbooks/macos-packaging.md says how to cut, install and remove a preview.

The stable path is unchanged.

How it was checked.

• Publish step: I extracted it from the workflow and dry-ran it with a stubbed gh for both a preview and a stable version. It issued the right create, upload and edit commands and wrote the right notes for each.
• Version rule: checked against stable, preview, nightly, npm-era and malformed versions.
• Not run: the workflow itself hasn't run. That takes a real signed macOS build and creates a public pre-release; the first preview cut will be its first run.

Upstream impact

None. .github/workflows/j5-release.yml and the runbook are J5-owned; FORK.md's packaging paragraph is updated to mention previews.

Checklist

• One concern: the description has no "also"
• Tests cover the changed behavior: workflow logic has no test harness here; the publish step was dry-run by hand and the first preview cut is its first real run
• UI changes: none
• Upstream-owned files: none edited
• Upstream product: no change to what upstream's product does
• Surfaces: CLI archives, installer, desktop DMG; no client, provider or contract change
• Docs: the packaging runbook gains the preview procedure

Built by Claude Opus 5.5 (1M context) in Claude Code.

🤖 Generated with Claude Code

Summary by CodeRabbit

• New Features
  • Preview versions can be published as pre-releases without replacing the latest stable release.
  • Preview builds are excluded from stable update channels. Preview desktop builds do not include an update feed; connected servers can still update to their matching version.
• Documentation
  • Added instructions for installing preview releases and returning to the stable channel, including removing preview release artifacts after shipping.

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Project	Deployment	Actions	Updated
j5-code	Ready	Preview	Oct 4, 2026 3:45am UTC

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📥 Commits

Reviewing files that changed from the base of the PR and between 108c661 and b1dcc0d.

📒 Files selected for processing (2)

• .github/workflows/j5-release.yml
• docs/j5/runbooks/macos-packaging.md

📝 Walkthrough

Walkthrough

The release workflow now accepts stable and dated preview versions. It validates release assets and publishes previews as GitHub pre-releases that are not marked latest. The release description and packaging runbook document preview release and installation procedures.

Changes

Preview release publishing

Layer / File(s)	Summary
Version validation and preview status .github/workflows/j5-release.yml	The workflow accepts stable or dated preview versions, checks package version consistency and the release floor, and exposes preview status to the release job.
Release validation, publishing, and preview instructions .github/workflows/j5-release.yml, FORK.md, docs/j5/runbooks/macos-packaging.md	The workflow validates desktop update metadata by release type and publishes previews as non-latest pre-releases. The release description and runbook document preview limitations, installation, updates, and cleanup.

Priority: ⬇️ Low

Estimated code review effort: 2 (Simple) | ~15 minutes

Change: Feature

Sequence Diagram(s)

sequenceDiagram
  participant SourceStep
  participant ReleaseJob
  participant GitHubRelease
  SourceStep->>ReleaseJob: Pass resolved preview status
  ReleaseJob->>ReleaseJob: Validate release assets and prepare notes
  ReleaseJob->>GitHubRelease: Create draft and upload assets
  ReleaseJob->>GitHubRelease: Publish preview as pre-release, not latest

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Merge Risk: 🔵 Low · up to 108c6

Preview publishing is isolated from stable releases, but the version guard and preview testing instructions should be corrected before relying on this workflow.

🚥 Pre-merge checks | ✅ 5

✅ Passed checks (5 passed)

Check name	Status	Explanation
Title check	✅ Passed	The title clearly identifies the change: publishing preview releases from an unmerged branch.
Description check	✅ Passed	The description covers the problem, changes, upstream impact, and checklist. It explains that workflow tests were not run and reports the manual dry runs and version checks. The UI section is not need…
Linked Issues check	✅ Passed	#437 requires the release workflow to accept preview versions, publish them as pre-releases that are not latest, keep previews out of stable update paths, and document preview operations. The workflow…
Out of Scope Changes check	✅ Passed	The workflow changes, FORK.md release description, and macOS packaging runbook all support #437. The runbook's release-contents and version-validation details explain the preview procedure and its c…
Docstring Coverage	✅ Passed	No functions found in the changed files to evaluate docstring coverage. Skipping docstring coverage check. Docstring coverage is scoped to functions touched by this diff. Analyzed 0 functions across 0…

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Actionable comments posted: 2

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• 🪄 Fix CodeRabbit comments on this PR

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Inline comments:
Review comments at @.github/workflows/j5-release.yml:
- Around line 73-75: Update the preview-version validation using the `preview`
and `versions` checks so preview versions are accepted only when their date is a
valid calendar date matching the current date and their counter is at least 1.
Preserve the existing stable-version and shared-version checks.

Review comments at @docs/j5/runbooks/macos-packaging.md:
- Around line 96-98: Update the Desktop app guidance in the macOS packaging
runbook to distinguish desktop-managed updates from boot-service updates:
clarify that preview DMGs without mock updates cannot complete desktop-managed
in-app updates, and direct exact-target-version in-app testing to boot-service
servers.

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• .github/workflows/j5-release.yml
• FORK.md
• docs/j5/runbooks/macos-packaging.md

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[Jacksondr5]

Review panel (Opus 5.5 code review, Astra testing). Fixed in the latest commit:

• A leftover draft could become "latest" (should-fix, Opus). The draft was created without --prerelease. If a run died after creating it and someone published the draft by hand, it would have become the latest release, and the stable installer URL would have served the preview's installer. The draft is now created as a pre-release.
• Runbook overstated the server-update offer (should-fix, Opus). A preview desktop app offers to update a server only when the server's x.y.z is lower (resolveVersionMismatch compares the core version). A server already on that x.y.z gets no offer. The runbook now says so, and how to run the test again.
• Blockmaps (nit, Opus, from reading electron-builder). A preview build still emits blockmaps; only latest-mac.yml is absent. The runbook is corrected.

Astra found nothing in the paths it could test. It extracted the changed steps from the YAML and dry-ran them with stand-ins:

• Version check: stable and preview accepted; nightly, malformed, mismatched and npm-era versions refused.
• Asset assembly: a preview with a stray latest-mac.yml fails.
• Publish step: correct for both fresh and existing releases.

It also confirmed that install.sh's stable tag pattern ignores a preview tag, and that a build at a preview version reports preview and asks for --allow-downgrade when returning to an older stable.

Not run by anyone: the workflow itself. The first preview cut is its first real run.