Integrated Addon Syncing Manager - Automatic Updates (Managing Addons Currently is a Mess)

And to be clear- I'm not crapping on your idea, I think it's a good one. However, with open source software there isn't necessarily any money so you have to think about these types of things with regard to service-based offerings. Personally, I think BlenderMarket would be a good place to approach with an idea like this- they certainly stand to gain the most from a utility like this. There's already money changing hands and there's already addon distribution infrastructure in place, it's just missing a tool to tie it all together. And such a tool would drive potential customers toward BlenderMarket and away from places like Gumroad or even github, so it makes sense for them to do something like that.

Agreed. It seems especially the last 2 years until 2.8 is released that addon installation is not standard. Most are (my experience is that >95% are; prefs, pick the compressed file etc,) but some are manually placed in the add-on folder incl. even a blender file with it, or even worse ProRender's goofy ad based system. Combine that with shellack of a central location to find them and that only anew adding automatic search for updates. They are a pain. Perhaps BF could create just a few standards for addons like autoupdate search etc. but I'm not a programmer so I don't know if its possible* @testure *

* @testure @ingapambi * This is exactly the conversation that needs to be happening. Thank you both for your comments.

I think using BlenderMarket as the standard is a great idea. As far as funding the resources, that's definitely a tricky part... and I have no answer for that. But, there has to be at least one solution out there. And I don't know enough about how it all works monetarily...

I hope others will continue to comment and come up with some ideas about that. Because it seems that that is one of, if not, the main hurdle of making this a thing.

Yeah it seems like it is sort of outdated and haphazard. I'd like to see a clean simple consistent way from writing the code through distribution to installation. There was a website years ago that was a blender repository but for lack of time, money or interest it closed down or was not adequately publicized. Blendernation has addons as well but I suppose the problem with Blender market is willingness to carry all addons even without commission. I hope there is an answer because many more artists are using blender now than when I started.* @penguinburger1 *

* @ xan2622 * new versions new bugs :) so autoupdate myst be strictly optional.

* @ Vyacheslav * Agreed.

Maybe have an automatic system as an option, but not default. It would benefit to see all the installed addons and have a notification for when a new version of that addon is available, asking the user if they'd like to update.

The addon updates would have to have a verified tested Blender version so that it could notify the user if they are on a different version or not.

* @penguinburger1 * yep. it would be nice to see the table, that shows status (updated or not) and small tips, what`s new with text and icons for typical changes: bugfixes, new functions, compatability with new versions of blender/addons et cetera.

The is true. "auto" update isn't as important to me as an efficient and timely way to know about the update status of addons as blender versions are released. Also, communication of use is distributed to many places as well. * @ Vyacheslav *

* @ xan2622 * There are only a handfull of addon stores, gumroad, blendermarket, etc. As an example of one solutions — stores can generate (pr draw from the list file) serial numbers per purchase, and send individually. It means what (lets say Gubroad) seller needs to add a serial number what can be "redeemed" in the AppStore-type sync service.

So true. * @-L0Lock- *

* @ingapambi * Actually there could be a solution: The official Python API could ship this module of the box.

And even better:
Since Blender's Python API already asks the wiki & bug tracker in the bl_info , he could also ask a release link, or detect it automatically form the links he already gets. From there, the module do its job.

bl_info = {
    "name":      "Addon Name",
    "description": "Some cool addon description",
    "author":    "Someone",
    "version":    (0, 0, 1),
    "blender":    (2, 80, 0),
    "location":    "View 3D > Default Cube",
    "warning":    "",
    "wiki_url":    "https://github.com/addon/wiki",
    "tracker_url": "https://github.com/addon/tracker",
    "release_url": "https://github.com/addon/release",
    "category":    "whoknows"
    }

* @-L0Lock- * I thought about this for quite a while already. I was going to write a package manager for blender addons, that will work like the addon update module but on steroids.

Modus operandi:

• Backend (With GitHub actions)

1. Scan Github for blender addons.
2. Determine the latest release/tag artifacts and find if they contain valid addon.
3. Create the addons database with addon metadata (name/desc/source etc.)
4. Deploy the database with a new tag.

• Frontend (utilize the addon update module . )

1. Get the latest database from Github.
2. Allow users to install addons directly from Blender.
3. Update installed addons automatically.

For addons developers, that would like to interfere with the crawler, they just need to put .bam YAML file containing addon metadata with some tags for automation. For addons that aren't hosted on GitHub, there would be user-maintained GitHub database containing .bam files for those.