#61 better download for distro packagers

[Aaron Griffin]

I think it might be a good idea to provide a better way
to download scripts for those who package things for a
given distro. Right now, the steps of upgrading a
packaged vim script are as follows:

find numeric source ID for new version
wget/snarf/curl URL with source ID
rename file "download_script.php?src_id=XYZ" to the
real filename (e.g. foo.zip)
package as normal

It might be nice to automate the file naming and source
ID lookup using simple url rewriting:
i.e.
http://www.vim.org/scripts/download/<scriptname>/<version>
produces a download for scriptname-version.vim or whatever.

Just a thought.

[Roy Orbitson]

There is potential to resolve this and save the site bandwidth with a simple redirect.

Visiting a particular URL could redirect to the latest version of the download. An example for checking the latest version:

https://www.vim.org/scripts/download_script.php?script_id=6138

Preferably, it would also be able parse a v:version-style parameter, so that Vim could avoid fetching a version that is incompatible:

https://www.vim.org/scripts/download_script.php?script_id=6138&vv=802

That would match records only where the stated required version is <= 8.2.

These should result in either a 404 response, or a 301 with a Location to the usual download URLs:

https://www.vim.org/scripts/download_script.php?src_id=28788

Plugin managers, etc. could thus do HEAD requests to check for new versions and avoid following the redirect and fetching the archive unless the src_id differs from a previous check.

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File names are available in the Content-Disposition header, e.g. attachment; filename=foo.zip.