Update specification-reference.md: Removes homepage suggestion under metadata

[jkylekelly]

This pull request updates the specification-reference.md file to revise the metadata section of the gem specification. The change removes references to the gem’s homepage from both the explanatory text and the example metadata.

As a first time reader, I was shocked that homepage was suggested under metadata. But then I realized it did in fact have a dedicated attribute. Suggesting to remove it from the metadata example to reduce confusion.

[deivid-rodriguez]

I think this makes sense, however, there is a metadata attribute too for the homepage and it actually takes priority over the dedicated attribute.

We have some issues about it in rubygems.org, see rubygems/rubygems.org#5544 or rubygems/rubygems.org#4924.

I think this documentation change may actually make those issues more common, so we should probably try fix the linked issues first before changing docs?

[jkylekelly]

@deivid-rodriguez I wasn't aware of the issues mentioned - Agreed that they should probably be fixed first! Surprised to learn the metadata attribute takes priority.

[kbrock]

I think there is a warning if spec.homepage is not defined. Don't think there is consensus on whether to use homepage or homepage_uri. I agree we should only have 1 of them.

[pboling]

One issue is that homepage is overloaded with functionality tied to the GitHub stars feature.
GitHub stars should come from metadata[:source_uri] or perhaps metadata[:github_uri]. I'd love to be able to list all the federated repositories for my gems in the metadata in a way that is structurally supported.

• metadata[:codeberg_uri] - Ideally this would display codeberg stars
• metadata[:sourcehut_uri] - Doesn't have stars
• metadata[:gitlab_uri] - Ideally this would display gitlab stars
• metadata[:github_uri] - only this one would inform the GH "star" feature

The tight integration and priority of GitHub is problematic for some people.

[kbrock]

@jkylekelly Not sure your final goal, but deprecating some metadata may be a large effort.

As the author of rubygems/rubygems.org#1234 - I can tell you that I did not intend on having homepage_uri. It slipped past me and dozens of stake holders. Multi year efforts across multiple repos are tricky.

If your goal is to deprecate homepage_uri, then be delibrate and possibly create a conversation over in rubygems/rubygems.org?

@pboiling Think this is a separate conversation. Maybe you can propose this in an issue over in rubygems or rubygems.org and see if you can get a good discussion and some traction over there.

Or you may want to create a PR that does gitlab stars if source_uri =~ /gitlab/? This could set a precedence for supporting non-GH providers.