Modernize python tooling

[salman2013]

Modernizes the Python tooling for this repo in three phases, aligning with the Open edX org standard established in openedx/sample-plugin.

Ticket: openedx/public-engineering#511
Parent ticket: openedx/public-engineering#506

Changes generated by Claude Sonnet 4.6 using the modernize-python-tooling skill, reviewed by a human.

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[irfanuddinahmad]

👋 Reviewed this against the same checklist we've been applying across the modernization effort. Nothing blocking — CI is green. One shared issue worth fixing:

pypa/gh-action-pypi-publish@release/v1 is a floating branch ref, not a pinned SHA. Same as flagged on the other PRs in this batch — this is what caused openedx/xblocks-core's release to fail with docker: manifest unknown (https://github.com/openedx/xblocks-core/actions/runs/29327012856/job/87066591905). Worth pinning to a commit SHA like the rest of this workflow's actions already are. (Traces back to openedx/sample-plugin's reference release.yml — filed openedx/sample-plugin#54 and openedx/xblocks-core#280 for that.)

major_on_zero/allow_zero_version are already correctly set here, nice.

[navinkarkera]

@salman2013 Thanks! This looks good.

[navinkarkera]

@salman2013 Is this ready to be merged now?