bug: dynamically parse the latest/actual release version when building docs

doc/source/conf.py

@@ -18,6 +18,8 @@
 from importlib.metadata import version
 from pathlib import Path
 
+import requests
+
 # If extensions (or modules to document with autodoc) are in another directory,
 # add these directories to sys.path here. If the directory is relative to the
 # documentation root, use Path().resolve() to make it absolute, like shown here.
@@ -68,11 +70,30 @@
 # |version| and |release|, also used in various other places throughout the
 # built documents.
 
+
+def _get_latest_release_from_github(org: str, repo_name: str) -> str:
+    """Get the highest version release (including prereleases) from GitHub
+    repository."""
+    url = f"https://api.github.com/repos/{org}/{repo_name}/releases"
+    response = requests.get(url)
+    releases = response.json()
+    valid_releases = [release for release in releases if "tag_name" in release]
+    if not valid_releases:
+        return "No valid releases found"
+    latest_version_release = valid_releases[0]["tag_name"]
+    return latest_version_release
+
+
+# Get the latest release version from GitHub repository
+org = "diffpy"
+repo_name = "diffpy.utils"
+latest_verion_from_github = _get_latest_release_from_github(org, repo_name)
+
 fullversion = version(project)
 # The short X.Y version.
 version = "".join(fullversion.split(".post")[:1])
 # The full version, including alpha/beta/rc tags.
-release = fullversion
+release = latest_verion_from_github
 
 # The language for content autogenerated by Sphinx. Refer to documentation
 # for a list of supported languages.

news/version-release.rst

@@ -0,0 +1,23 @@
+**Added:**
+
+* <news item>
+
+**Changed:**
+
+* Method to retrieve the latest package version from GitHub's release page in the official documentation. The latest release on GitHub is used to retrieve the latest version of the package instead of a tag.
+
+**Deprecated:**
+
+* <news item>
+
+**Removed:**
+
+* <news item>
+
+**Fixed:**
+
+* <news item>
+
+**Security:**
+
+* <news item>