[HOW TO] Mod hosting sites - comparation and best practices

[HOW TO] Mod hosting sites - comparation and best practices

tl;dr
Learn and use Github.com for you mod hosting site

As story of the Bob, a young modder:
- get's an idea about mod, spend days to learn weidu, write lot of code
- spend days for testing first release, he want to be sure that everything is fine
- feels excited to show his creation to other people and receive feedback,
- after all those long hours of work, he create mod package

Let's stop here for a moment and ask: how he package his mod, what tools he use and what are thiny details which he didin't miss? This will be covered in other guide so for now, let's assume that he done his best.

- and the time is finally come to upload his mod

At this moment, Bob looks for file hosting services. He finds some shiny sites with "Upload" button and he hear wisper "Yessss, click me!" ...

Let's stop here for a moment and ask: what hosting site he chose for uploading his mod? And why it's important? Here are requirements for good mod download link:

it can be used by wget to check file size: wget.exe link --spider --no-check-certificate
it will not change when uploading/updated the same file
do not require chapta after several downloads (http://prntscr.com/6pk42t)
do not advertise some adware/crapware/downloader etc
do not expire after 30 or more days without download (every popular hosting site like speeedyshare, mediafire has such terms)
do not require user interaction to be downloaded ( mediafire.com,googledrive.com has JavaScript download link generator that require user click)
do not depend on the filename (dropbox.com/s/q72jpl132fj53lv/ModName-v1.zip?dl=1)

Here are few various sites which he found:

1. Own hosting server

you need to pay for it and as soon as you stop the download link will be broken
you need to pay for the domain if you don't want to use direct IP adress
you need to install software in order to have unchanged download links for files
you need to take care about REIABLE backups

2. The forums.beamdog.com by adding mod archive as attachement

direct link to file will change every time when you upload new version of the mod
mod archve will have random and meaningless filename: https://us.v-cdn.net/5019558/uploads/editor/0n/u0o8jprjthu44.zip
mod is doomed as soon as Beamdog company will close the forums. "What?!? Beamdog will never close forums!" Ye, surem take look what happend with https://forum.bioware.com It might not happen soon, but if other much bigger companies with much more money decided to close their forums it's almost inevitable that beamdog forum will be closed someday.

3. shsforums.net (gibberlings3.net site is using the same hosting but you cannot upload mods there)

abandoned forum without progress/improvements/moderation
in the past years, site had several crashes and went offline for several days

3. Dropbox, Google Drive, OneDrive or other private/public clouds

you cannot download mod file by using comandline tools like wget or Invoke-WebRequest
direct link to file will change every time when you upload new version of the mod

4. MediaFire, ZippyShare, Uploaded, 4Shared and other similar shitty sites

adversting
chapta puzzle in order to download file
mod will be deleted after 30 days since last download
you cannot download mod file by using comandline tools like wget or Invoke-WebRequest
direct link to file will change every time when you upload new version of the mod
uncertain future

This is by far worst choise whch Bob could make. Seriusly, avoid it at all cost.

All those sites aren't best way of hosting you mods. Let's talk about GitHub.com site. What makes it so great for mod hosting site?

bacause it's not only simple file hosting, it's a hosting for 'git' code repositories
bacause git itself is a "source code control version system" and comes with lot of extra features
because GitHub.com extend git functionality and provide even more userfull features

Adventages:

free
no adversting
no chapta puzzle
99.99% time online
enterprise backup of the files
files will stay forever regardles of the last download time and age
no chances to completly disapear because Google, Microsoft, Facebook and other companyes keep their project there
always the same and unchanged download links for mod or even individual mod files
ability to use comandline tools like wget or Invoke-WebRequest to download always up to date mod archive

Extra Fetures:

you can develop you mod with more than one people at once
you can see content of the code/text files directly throught web interface
if you have account, you can have a mini-site for you mod/readme: https://sampsca.github.io/
if you have account, you can add comments to each line of the code/text files
if you have account, you can edit and correct spelling mistakes for other mods directly throught web interface

Disadvantages: