Create a JavaScript Action

An opinionated alternative template to actions/javascript-action to bootstrap the creation of a JavaScript action. 🚀

Use this template to bootstrap the creation of a JavaScript action. 🚀 Alternative to actions/javascript-action.

This template includes release automation, tests, linting, publishing, starter docs, and versioning guidance.

Usage

Reference the published semantic tag, e.g. major:

uses: github-developer/javascript-action@v1
with:
  milliseconds: 1000

or minor:

uses: github-developer/javascript-action@v1.0
with:
  milliseconds: 1000

or patch:

uses: github-developer/javascript-action@v1.0.0
with:
  milliseconds: 1000

See the actions tab for runs of this action! 🚀

Development

1. Update your action metadata in `action.yml`

action.yml defines the inputs and output for your action.

Update the action.yml with your name, description, inputs and outputs for your action.

See the documentation.

2. Write your action code in `lib`

Most toolkit and CI/CD operations involve async operations so the action is run in an async function.

const core = require('@actions/core');
...

async function run() {
  try {
      ...
  }
  catch (error) {
    core.setFailed(error.message);
  }
}

run()

See the toolkit documentation for the various packages.

3. Test your action in `tests`

Jest and Nock are included as suggestions for test and mocking frameworks.

A sample Unit Test workflow is provided which runs on every pull request and push to the main branch.

4. Automate releases with GitHub Actions

The entrypoint to your action is defined by runs.using in action.yml.

This project uses a prepare script leveraging @vercel/ncc to compile and package the code into one minified dist/index.js file, enabling fast and reliable execution and preventing the need to check in the whole dependency tree in node_modules.

Here, dist is intentionally not committed to Git branches for three reasons:

Encourage users to reference your action using semantically versioned tags like v1, v1.1.5, etc. instead of branches (docs).
Avoid a security vulnerability attack vector by encouraging community contributions to source code only, ignoring proposed compiled release assets.
Let automation do the hard part 🤖.

A sample Publish workflow is provided which runs on a release event to compile and package source code into dist, and force push major and minor tag versions according to the semantic version of the release. You can kick off this workflow and publish to GitHub Marketplace simply by using the GitHub UI to create a new semantically versioned release like v1.0.3.

🔁 Commit to open source maintainership

A healthy open source community starts with communication. Either in this repository or in your organization's .github repository, we recommend reviewing, editing, and adopting:

CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md for how to engage in community
CONTRIBUTING.md for how to contribute to this project
LICENSE.md for how to legally use and contribute to the project
SECURITY.md for responsibly disclosing vulnerabilities
Issue and pull request templates

Issues and pull requests from the open source community should be attended to in a prompt, friendly, and proactive manner. Two sample workflows, stale and labeler are provided to help with two small repetitious tasks.

See Open Source Guides for more guidance on maintaining a strong community.

License

MIT

Contributing

Pull requests are welcome! See CONTRIBUTING.md for more.

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