feat: create releases without promoting a channel

[alongubkin]

This PR adds create-only releases to Alien.

SDKs and the CLI stay versioned as today.

User flow: You want to release normally

No changes needed. alien release still advances production; --channel staging still advances staging.

User flow: You want to publish now and deploy later

alien release --no-promote --title "Fix checkout"

This saves a release without changing a channel or scheduling deployment updates. The output includes its ID and the command to promote it later.

alien releases promote <release-id> --channel production

You can also use Promote this exact release in the dashboard.

User flow: You want to reuse your CI build

Download the successful CI build's .alien artifact, then run:

alien release --prebuilt --no-promote --title "Fix checkout"

No application rebuild is needed. Local image artifacts are pushed; existing remote image URIs are reused. Promotion later uses the saved release, even if the branch has advanced.

User flow: You want an urgent production fix

Create the release with --no-promote, inspect it, then promote its ID directly to production. Staging is optional.

How we tested this locally

• Ran the built CLI against a local HTTP API and PostgreSQL using the test platform: create-only left production, staging, deployment rows, and update queues unchanged.

• Published a newer release, then promoted the original ID: only its production deployment was queued. The saved CI artifact was unchanged, and --title persisted.

• Repeated create-only through the CLI's stackless path; channels and update queues stayed unchanged.

• Executed both printed promotion commands with a differently linked project and conflicting project/workspace/server defaults. Each command promoted only the selected project.

This checks release creation and scheduling, not a cloud rollout.

• Captured actual HTTP requests for prebuilt and stackless releases: promote: false is sent and channel is omitted.
• Verified the prebuilt stack is reused unchanged, including its remote image URI.
• Verified --no-promote works with the default arguments, rejects an explicit --channel, and rejects manager mode before any network or build work.
• Verified the generated TypeScript SDK preserves explicit false and omitted defaults.

cargo check -p alien-cli, the executable build, release-command tests, and Rust/TypeScript CI pass. The changed Rust file passes formatting checks.

Client artifacts were regenerated with generate:api-copy-openapi and generate:api-platform-sdk. TypeScript package CI passes, including the generated SDK build. A separate local full-SDK rebuild exceeded the Node heap limit; request serialization was checked locally. Server support must be deployed before this CLI is published.

[enclave-ai]

Enclave skipped this draft pull request. It will run automatically when you mark the PR as Ready for review.

[greptile-apps]

Confidence Score: 5/5

[Critical risk] Adds optional channel promotion control to release API.

The PR appears safe to merge; the previous promotion-hint issue is fixed and no new actionable issue was found.

What we checked:

• Promotion accepts the saved project: The project lookup accepts an ID or a name, so the hint can use the saved project ID instead of the directory's linked project.

Summary

Adds --no-promote so users can save a release without advancing a channel. The Platform SDK contract adds the optional promote field.

• Normal releases still advance their selected channel.
• Built and stackless create-only releases send promote: false without a channel.
• Both printed promotion commands now retain the project, workspace, and server.

Diagram

%%{init: {'theme': 'neutral'}}%%
flowchart LR
    A[alien release] --> B{--no-promote?}
    B -->|No| C[Save release and advance channel]
    B -->|Yes| D[Save release without changing channel]
    D --> E[Print promotion command with saved context]
    E --> F[User promotes the saved release later]

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_{Reviews (2) · Last reviewed commit: "fix: preserve release target in promotio..." · Reviewed by Greptile}