ci: pre-release by making a pre-release on github

Author: mogita

.github/workflows/prerelease.yml

@@ -1,11 +1,8 @@
 name: Pre-release
 
 on:
-  push:
-    tags:
-      - '*-alpha.*'
-      - '*-beta.*'
-      - '*-rc.*'
+  release:
+    types: [prereleased]
 
 jobs:
   Prerelease:
@@ -16,8 +13,19 @@ jobs:
         with:
           fetch-depth: 0
 
-      - name: Extract version from tag
-        run: echo "VERSION=${GITHUB_REF_NAME}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
+      - name: Resolve version
+        run: |
+          TAG="${{ github.event.release.tag_name }}"
+          if [ -n "$TAG" ]; then
+            echo "VERSION=$TAG" >> $GITHUB_ENV
+          else
+            PROP=$(grep '^version=' gradle.properties | cut -d'=' -f2)
+            if [ -n "$PROP" ]; then
+              echo "VERSION=$PROP" >> $GITHUB_ENV
+            else
+              echo "❌ Could not determine version from tag or gradle.properties" && exit 1
+            fi
+          fi
 
       - name: Setup JDK 17
         uses: actions/setup-java@v5.1.0
@@ -30,7 +38,7 @@ jobs:
 
       - name: Publish to MavenCentral
         run: |
-          ./gradlew publishToSonatype --no-daemon --max-workers 1 closeAndReleaseSonatypeStagingRepository
+          ./gradlew -Pversion=$VERSION publishToSonatype --no-daemon --max-workers 1 closeAndReleaseSonatypeStagingRepository
         env:
           STREAM_API_KEY: ${{ vars.STREAM_API_KEY }}
           STREAM_API_SECRET: ${{ secrets.STREAM_API_SECRET }}
@@ -42,9 +50,3 @@ jobs:
           SIGNING_SECRET_KEY_RING_FILE: ${{ secrets.SIGNING_SECRET_KEY_RING_FILE }}
           SONATYPE_STAGING_PROFILE_ID: ${{ secrets.SONATYPE_STAGING_PROFILE_ID }}
 
-      - name: Create pre-release on GitHub
-        uses: ncipollo/release-action@v1
-        with:
-          tag: ${{ env.VERSION }}
-          prerelease: true
-          token: ${{ secrets.GITHUB_TOKEN }}

CONTRIBUTING.md

@@ -120,3 +120,7 @@ The job creates a pull request with the changelog. Check if it looks good.
 - Merge the pull request.
 
 Once the PR is merged, it automatically kicks off another job which will upload the Gem to RubyGems.org and creates a GitHub release.
+
+### Pre-releases
+
+Push a tag (e.g. `1.0.0-beta.1`), then go to **GitHub Releases → Draft a new release**, select the tag, check **"Set as a pre-release"**, and publish. The CI job will trigger automatically and publish to MavenCentral.