Action Versioning in GitHub Actions

1. Introduction

Action versioning is essential for managing the lifecycle of GitHub Actions, ensuring that the correct and expected behavior is maintained across different deployments. This lesson covers key concepts, strategies, and best practices for versioning your custom actions in GitHub.

2. Key Concepts

• **Semantic Versioning (SemVer)**: A versioning scheme that uses three numbers (major.minor.patch) to indicate changes in the codebase.
• **Tags**: Git tags are used to mark specific points in history as important, typically used for release versions.
• **Docker Images**: If your action is built as a Docker container, the versioning can be tied to the image tags.

3. Versioning Strategies

Here are common strategies for versioning your actions:

1. Use Semantic Versioning: Bump the major version for breaking changes, minor for new features, and patch for bug fixes.
2. Tagging Releases: Create a Git tag for each version and push it to the repository.
3. Branching Strategy: Maintain a stable branch for production and a development branch for ongoing work.

4. Step-by-Step Guide

Follow these steps to implement versioning in your GitHub Actions:

1. Create a new Git tag for your action:
git tag v1.0.0
git push origin v1.0.0

2. Update your action.yml file with the new version:
name: 'My Action'
description: 'An example GitHub Action'
runs:
  using: 'node12'
  main: 'dist/index.js'
version: 'v1.0.0'

3. Reference the action in your workflow:
steps:
- uses: username/my-action@v1.0.0

5. Best Practices

• Keep your action.yml file updated with the latest version number.
• Use GitHub Actions to automate your release process.
• Document the changes in a CHANGELOG.md file for transparency.

6. FAQ