First, thank you all for the engagement on this topic!
To summarize where we are so far in this discussion:
github repositories is a beneficial storage solution that provides a lot of features that we would be unwise to rebuild in its entirety
automating the management of 'triplea_maps.yaml' is welcome
documentation effort is needed to make the upload process clear. We should create at least a thread, if not a category to provide help for uploading
Follow-Up Topics to Discuss in other Threads
A number of other topics were raised that could use discussion. I'm thinking to create a thread titled something like: "How should we improve the maps ecosystem" where we could discuss the many other aspects of maps and what could use improvement.
Still under consideration: zip uploads that are automatically stored as repositories
First, if we automate the generation of 'triplea_maps.yaml' by finding data that is stored in the repositories, we'll have taken care of a portion of the download side. Specifically the idea here is that 'triplea_maps.yaml' has a section for each map, essentially we move each section of that file to the respective map repository where the backend would be configured to find it. In this way the backend could effectively generate the 'triplea_maps.yaml' file.
A really nice thing about the above is the backend wouldn't care how the map data gets into repository. After we get to that point, it could make sense to build an in-game uploader that takes a zip file and uploads it into a repository. There is enough complexity in doing that where I don't know if it would be worth it, so we'll need to play it by ear when and if we get there.
