It appears to be impossible to install the observability operators (and possibly any optional operator installed in an openshift-* namespace) using the new Ecosystem/Software catalog interface.

Test setup:

• CRC cluster, OCP 4.20.5.
• Logged in as kubeadmin

Issues.

1. The Software Catalog screen requires the user to select a project before installing an operator. The observability operators recommend a standard "openshift-" namespace* during installation. The user is not intended to select their own namespace for these operators. It is possible to install the operators in non-standard namespaces but it will complicate support and documentation if users do so as a matter of course.
2. Observability operators are not visible via the new catalog. Entering "logging" in the filter box returns nothing. Clicking the "Observability" group shows a couple of 3rd-party helm charts and does not show any of the RH observability operators.

None of the following operators can be found via the Software Catalog UI:

$ oc get -n openshift-marketplace packagemanifests | grep -E '(logging|tempo|obs).*Red Hat'
node-observability-operator                      Red Hat Operators     40d
skupper-netobs-operator                          Red Hat Operators     40d
netobserv-operator                               Red Hat Operators     40d
cluster-logging                                  Red Hat Operators     40d
cluster-observability-operator                   Red Hat Operators     40d
tempo-product        

If there is a new, alternative way to install these operators it needs to be documented AND it needs to be made obvious from the UI, which currently makes it appear like all our operators have just vanished.

The 4.20 docs seem to have dropped all useful logging documentation: https://docs.redhat.com/en/documentation/openshift_container_platform/4.20/html-single/logging/index. I haven't checked docs for other obs. operators.