refactor: address pre-merge review

- Remove the catalog-index mode (script, --catalog-index flag, docs): it can't
  work until catalog-extending plugins boot (the catalog gap), so shipping it
  would only produce failures. Re-add when that wiring lands.
- Workflow: scope pull_request to branches [main, release-*], matching sibling
  workflows.
- discoverPlugins: guard the per-dir package.json parse so one malformed plugin
  dir doesn't abort discovery of the rest.
- Make the summary say 'skipped (no backend plugins)' for frontend-only input so
  a green doesn't overstate coverage.
- Drop the now-internal-only export on resolveEntryPoint.

Kept run() as-is (a clear named 'no shell' helper, likely reused).

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>

Author: gustavolira

.github/workflows/native-smoke.yaml

@@ -13,6 +13,9 @@ name: Native Smoke Harness
 
 on:
   pull_request:
+    branches:
+      - main
+      - "release-*"
     paths:
       - "smoke-tests-native/**"
       - ".github/workflows/native-smoke.yaml"

smoke-tests-native/README.md

@@ -45,15 +45,11 @@ Requires Node 24 and Yarn 4 (matching the repo's `versions.json` and the sibling
 ```bash
 yarn install
 
-# A) explicit OCI refs for one workspace
 cat > dp.yaml <<'YAML'
 plugins:
   - package: oci://ghcr.io/redhat-developer/rhdh-plugin-export-overlays/<plugin>:<tag>!<name>
 YAML
 yarn smoke --dynamic-plugins dp.yaml
-
-# B) a whole catalog index image
-CATALOG_INDEX_IMAGE=<image> yarn smoke:catalog-index
 ```
 
 `yarn check` runs `tsc --noEmit`. This is a standalone tool dir, not a

smoke-tests-native/package.json

@@ -12,7 +12,6 @@
   "scripts": {
     "build": "esbuild src/native-smoke.ts --bundle --platform=node --format=esm --packages=external --outfile=dist/native-smoke.mjs",
     "smoke": "yarn build && node dist/native-smoke.mjs",
-    "smoke:catalog-index": "yarn build && node dist/native-smoke.mjs --catalog-index",
     "tsc:check": "tsc --noEmit",
     "check": "yarn tsc:check"
   },

smoke-tests-native/src/loader.ts

@@ -55,7 +55,13 @@ export function discoverPlugins(root: string): PluginManifest {
     const pkgPath = join(dir, "package.json");
     if (!existsSync(pkgPath)) continue;
 
-    const pkg = JSON.parse(readFileSync(pkgPath, "utf8"));
+    let pkg: { name?: string; version?: string; backstage?: { role?: string } };
+    try {
+      pkg = JSON.parse(readFileSync(pkgPath, "utf8"));
+    } catch {
+      // A malformed package.json in one dir shouldn't abort discovery of the rest.
+      continue;
+    }
     const role: string = pkg.backstage?.role ?? "";
     const item: PluginEntry = {
       name: pkg.name ?? entry.name,
@@ -74,7 +80,7 @@ export function discoverPlugins(root: string): PluginManifest {
 }
 
 /** Resolve the entry point for a backend plugin package. */
-export function resolveEntryPoint(pluginPath: string): string {
+function resolveEntryPoint(pluginPath: string): string {
   const pkgPath = join(pluginPath, "package.json");
   if (!existsSync(pkgPath)) {
     throw new Error(`package.json not found in ${pluginPath}`);

smoke-tests-native/src/native-smoke.ts

@@ -24,8 +24,6 @@
  *
  * Usage:
  *   yarn smoke --dynamic-plugins <dynamic-plugins.yaml> [--out results.json]
- *   # or, to extract a whole catalog index instead of explicit OCI refs:
- *   CATALOG_INDEX_IMAGE=<image> yarn smoke:catalog-index
  */
 
 import { execFileSync } from "node:child_process";
@@ -104,29 +102,16 @@ function computeStatus(
   return "pass";
 }
 
-// Write the dynamic-plugins.yaml the CLI consumes, then extract (the part PR #2231
+// Copy the dynamic-plugins.yaml the CLI consumes, then extract (the part PR #2231
 // hand-rolled in 694 lines — now one CLI call).
-async function extractPlugins(
-  root: string,
-  useCatalogIndex: boolean,
-  dynamicPlugins: string | undefined,
-  catalogIndexImage: string | undefined,
-): Promise<void> {
-  if (useCatalogIndex) {
-    // Empty list => CLI extracts everything from CATALOG_INDEX_IMAGE.
-    await writeFile(join(root, "dynamic-plugins.yaml"), "plugins: []\n");
-  } else if (dynamicPlugins) {
-    await copyFile(dynamicPlugins, join(root, "dynamic-plugins.yaml"));
-  }
+async function extractPlugins(root: string, dynamicPlugins: string): Promise<void> {
+  await copyFile(dynamicPlugins, join(root, "dynamic-plugins.yaml"));
   console.log("▶ extracting plugins via CLI…");
   // The CLI reads dynamic-plugins.yaml from its CWD, so run it inside `root`
   // (where we just wrote the config) and extract into the same dir.
   execFileSync(process.execPath, [CLI_BIN, "install", root], {
     stdio: "inherit",
     cwd: root,
-    env: catalogIndexImage
-      ? { ...process.env, CATALOG_INDEX_IMAGE: catalogIndexImage }
-      : process.env,
   });
 }
 
@@ -173,20 +158,15 @@ async function main(): Promise<number> {
   const { values } = parseArgs({
     options: {
       "dynamic-plugins": { type: "string" },
-      "catalog-index": { type: "boolean" },
       out: { type: "string" },
     },
   });
 
   const out = values.out ?? "results.json";
   const dynamicPlugins = values["dynamic-plugins"];
-  const useCatalogIndex = values["catalog-index"] ?? false;
-  const catalogIndexImage = process.env.CATALOG_INDEX_IMAGE;
 
-  if (!useCatalogIndex && !dynamicPlugins) {
-    console.error(
-      "Provide --dynamic-plugins <yaml> OR --catalog-index with CATALOG_INDEX_IMAGE set.",
-    );
+  if (!dynamicPlugins) {
+    console.error("Provide --dynamic-plugins <dynamic-plugins.yaml>.");
     return 2;
   }
 
@@ -198,7 +178,7 @@ async function main(): Promise<number> {
   await mkdir(root, { recursive: true });
 
   try {
-    await extractPlugins(root, useCatalogIndex, dynamicPlugins, catalogIndexImage);
+    await extractPlugins(root, dynamicPlugins);
 
     const manifest = discoverPlugins(root);
     console.log(
@@ -231,10 +211,13 @@ async function main(): Promise<number> {
     };
 
     await writeFile(out, JSON.stringify(report, null, 2));
+    const startLabel = start.skipped
+      ? "skipped (no backend plugins — frontend bundle presence only)"
+      : String(start.ok);
     console.log(`▶ report → ${out} (status: ${report.status})`);
     console.log(
       `  backend loaded ${report.backend.loaded}/${report.backend.total}, ` +
-        `start=${start.ok}, frontend ${frontend.valid}/${manifest.frontend.length}`,
+        `start=${startLabel}, frontend ${frontend.valid}/${manifest.frontend.length}`,
     );
     return report.status === "pass" ? 0 : 1;
   } catch (err) {