How to distribute your mod

[Omega]

So you finished your new mod after weeks of effort? Or perhaps you're about to release a beta to show others how your work is going?

STOP.

There's still some things to do for distributing your mod. These are not rules that must be followed (ie, we won't remove your post for not following them), but they can increase the downloads your mod gets, can improve community reception, makes your mod easier for others to install, and overall improves your mod in various ways. You can think of them as guidelines for getting the most out of your mod.

Ensure it's in a manageable format.

• Mods should generally be distributed as either a zip or 7z, for compatibility. While you can use formats like bz2 or gz as well, they are frowned on because they are not only inferior to 7z in compression rate, but cannot be used as an archive in GAE. As well, the extra tar file can confuse users, whereas 7z and zip only have one archive file.
• 7z archives must be non-solid. This ensures support with GAE's addons.
• Mods should be released in the addons format, which ensures that all engines can install the mods equally easy and with a standard (GAE users can copy the archive to the addons folder, which Glest and MegaGlest users can extract it to their User data folder.

Upload to a suitable location

• There's no perfect host for files, sadly, as most hosting sites will eventually delete inactive files, some lose files for no reason, etc. Some of the top tier hosts are Dropbox, Free-hidrive, and various other personal file hosts.
• GitHub can also be used as a repository for containing all files in an accessible format, and is particularly handy for collaborative efforts, though is more complex and will require some time to learn how to use it.
• Uploading to multiple locations such as a regular host, sites like ModDB and GitHub provide alternative locations to download as well as make your mod easier to find.

Post a forum thread

• If you haven't done so already, make sure you have a dedicated thread specifically for your mod on the board. Don't post the links in some other topic, make a new one.
• Have a proper first post in that topic, as that will be the most visited post. The current downloads should always be there, and there should be screens and information about the mod. If the first post consists of only a single sentence and a link, don't expect any downloads. Update that post with each release. Also, editing the title of the first post changes the title of the entire thread, new releases should take advantage of that.
• Don't make more than one thread about your mod, even if it's a new version. Stick with editing existing posts.

Place your mod on the Glest Wiki

• The Glest Wiki is the number one result in search engines for Glest mods, so take advantage of that and ensure your mod is mentioned there.
• Make sure your mod appears in the Mods/List page (for techtrees and factions), the Tilesets/List page (for tilesets), the Scenarios/List page (for scenarios), or the Maps/List page (for maps). If it's already there, ensure the download link is up to date.
• Consider making an individual page for your mod (such as how Apocalyptic Dawn or Japanese do). This forms a central location from which you can document your mod.
• Ensure you're familiar with the Wiki's guidelines before editing. If you need help with editing, take a look at the Help Wiki or post in the wiki forum thread.

Ensure your mod has stated a license

• All mods need to have a declared license, or else others do not know what they can or cannot do with your work. The most common license for mods is CC-BY-SA, which means that the users can use your work in any way as long as they credit the author(s) and release it under the same or a similar license. Another common license is CC-0 which is effectively a way of ensuring your mod is public domain in any location, and users can do anything they want with it, no need to credit the author and no restrictions on their licensing. CC-BY-NC-SA is generally frowned upon because it prevents only indy developers from using your work, as major developers would never use a Creative Commons license anyway.
• If you use any work by other authors (eg, you use a song by another author licensed as CC-BY-SA), you should include an "AUTHORS" text file with your mod that lists all the other authors, what work is theirs, and the license it is under. You can use multiple different licenses by explaining them here.

Promoting your mod

• Consider having your mod on sites such as ModDB, news sites, modding boards, etc to gather players from outside of the existing Glest community.
• Place a link and basic information in your signature. Signatures can be edited in Profile > Forum Profile.
• Consider letting real life friends know of the mod, advising them to spread it on to others, and use sites like Facebook, Twitter, and blog sites to reach out to others.
• Listen to community feedback: others opinions can often help improve your mod, keeping them coming back for more
• MegaGlest mods can be added to the Game Mods menu which also makes them eligible for free hosting on megaglest.org (contact the MegaGlest team). MegaGlest mods which are not ready to go into the Game Mods menu yet can still be mirrored on megaglest.org if they are not a pre-release version ("alpha", "beta" or similar) and licensing terms allow for mirroring them. When contacting the MegaGlest team, provide the original download location, file description and licensing terms.

[tomreyn]

Omega, could you please remove the hint on installing mods to the MegaGlest installation directory? That's no longer supported - any data not distributed with the game should always be installed where UserData_Root points to.

For file hosting, http://www.free-hidrive.com/ may be another option. They offer 5 GB shareable storage which can be accessed through standard protocols and allows for direct downloads (no turret tests), such as via wget. Unfortunately it turns out that HiDrive restricts the number of downloads allowed per file to ridiculously low amounts (limits of 5 and 30 downloads, as well as expiring URLs were reported). So this may not be the greatest option after all.

MegaGlest mods can be added to the Game Mods menu which also makes them eligible for (optional) free hosting at megaglest.org (just contact us).

MegaGlest mods which are not ready to go into the Game Mods menu, yet, can still be mirrored on megaglest.org if they are not a pre-release version ("alpha", "beta" or similar) and licensing terms allow for mirroring them. Just contact me directly, prividing the original download location, file description and licensing terms.

Edit: Updated 'HiDrive' description

[Omega]

Omega, could you please remove the hint on installing mods to the MegaGlest installation directory? That's no longer supported - any data not distributed with the game should always be installed where UserData_Root points to.

I revised the statement to use the user data folder instead, which works too. Though it is worth noting that the player very much can use the installation folder if they wish, which could prove handy if there's a large number of users sharing the same mods (eg, it'd be very impractical to place a mod in every individual's user folder if there was a large network of, oh, let's say 100 people; it'd be a royal pain to update, too).

For file hosting, http://www.free-hidrive.com/ may be another option (5 GB shareable storage which can be accessed through standard protocols).

I replaced sugarsync with it, as sugarsync apparently has the nasty hidden restriction that no public link can be for a file greater than 25MB (even though you can host larger files). Bad sugarsync, bad.

MegaGlest mods can be added to the Game Mods menu which also makes them eligible for (optional) free hosting at megaglest.org (just contact us).

MegaGlest mods which are not ready to go into the Game Mods menu, yet, can still be mirrored on megaglest.org if they are not a pre-release version ("alpha", "beta" or similar) and licensing terms allow for mirroring them. Just contact me directly, prividing the original download location, file description and licensing terms.

I added this in as well, under slight revising.

[tomreyn]

For what it's worth, a good overview of file hosting services is available at Wikipedia. When submitting a mod for review to MegaGlest, please only choose those file hosting services which allow for direct access (that's a column title on this table), otherwise your mods are likely to be rejected. File expiration and traffic/bandwidth limits are the other most relevant factors obviously.

Edit: Fix spelling.

[tomreyn]

Github has recently worked on making things much easier to use. There is now Github for Windows and Github for OS X.

It's definitely worth giving it a try. If you are new to Git and source code repositories you will still want to read the Getting Started guides: Windows, OS X.

Should you prefer to use the command line, this is the place to go.