fix: [#1275] Return version if regal installed using go install

[sbp-bvanb]

Return version if regal is installed using go install.

[anderseknert]

This would need to be updated continuously with each new release, and I don't think that's feasible.

Looking at one of the links you provided, and as @srenatus previously mentioned, this method looks more appealing https://github.com/vektra/mockery/blob/master/pkg/logging/logging.go#L36-L45

Would you want to give that a shot?

[sbp-bvanb]

I tried, but I wonder whether it will work: golang/go#50603 (comment)

Locally I have tried:

func buildVersion() string {
	version, ok := debug.ReadBuildInfo()
	fmt.Println("----------", version.Main.Version)
	if ok && version.Main.Version != "(devel)" && version.Main.Version != "" {
		return version.Main.Version
	}
	return "unknown"
}

func New() Info {
	return Info{
		Version:   buildVersion(),
		GoVersion: goVersion,
		Platform:  platform,
		Commit:    unknownString(Commit),
		Timestamp: unknownString(Timestamp),
		Hostname:  unknownString(Hostname),
	}
}

and

go build -ldflags "-s -w -X github.com/styrainc/regal/pkg/version.Version=1.2.3"

./regal version

---------- (devel)
Version:    unknown
Go Version: go1.23.3
Platform:   darwin/arm64
Commit:     unknown
Timestamp:  unknown
Hostname:   unknown

[anderseknert]

@sbp-bvanb yeah, having looked into this tonight, I don't think I've seen a single project where this works without having some external script setting the version somewhere in a file, and then have that read for this data.

From what I now gather, the "module version" we thought would work here is merely the version that could possibly be extracted from the module path, like "v2" in "github.com/styrainc/regal/v2" if that was a thing. Sorry if I led you astray here.

Like I said before, I think we can rule out any system that requires us to update some file manually each time we push a release. That's prone to being forgotten about, or be done wrong. So the alternative that remains would be to have a github action or similar do this for us. Or perhaps if Goreleaser can do something like that. I'll leave your issue open for ideas, but I think we can close this PR for now as neither your or my own attempts to get it working this way got where we wanted.