preload-local-actions for GitHub Actions

About

This action will preload selected repositories into your workspace at one time. As GitHub has not provided a way to expose actions exclusively to a private organization, the workflow using the private actions must currently preload any private action before using it.

Usage

Preloading Actions to Use

The example will load the contents of a private repo into your workspace. Since they cannot be preloaded by GitHub when your workflow starts (due to being in private or internal repositories) you will need to manually load them into working folders.

name: preload-local-actions

on:
    push:
        branches:
            - main
            - master
    pull_request:
        types: [opened, synchronize, reopened]

jobs:
    example-job:
        runs-on: ubuntu-latest
        steps:
            - uses: actions/checkout@v2 # Checks out your repository, which should be done first

            - name: preload-local-actions
              uses: AmericanAirlines/preload-local-actions@v1.0.5 # be sure to use the latest release
              with:
                  repository: |
                      ownerOrOrg/repo_for_action1@v1.3.5
                      ownerOrOrg/repo_for_action2@v1.0.9
                  token: ${{ secrets.MY_READONLY_PAT }} # must have permissions to read all repositories

            - name: additional steps will use the loaded actions as needed from their

Note that the action requires use of a secret (here MY_READONLY_PAT). For security purposes, it is important that you only use a read-only access token because it has only repository read permissions for the private GitHub organization. Since it is a Personal Access Token, it is important that it does not have any other permissions or scopes attached to it.

Please use the latest release tag according to the repository. The ref option above is only an example (it is most recent as of the last update to this document) and may not always be up to date.

Using the Preloaded Actions

You will then use a step like this to run one of the two actions (as preloaded in the above example)

      - name: step to do the action loaded from a private or internal repo
          uses: ./.github/actions/repo_for_action1  # the last part matches the name of the repo preloaded
          with:
            version: 'v1'  # these are the inputs for the action to use (just as any action)

In the preloading step above, the preload action loads two private or internal actions. You will need a step like the one above for every use of either action.

Inputs

Name	Type	Required	Description
repository	String	true	Single string with org/repo@version OR multi-line yaml string with one such string per line (e.g. ownerOrOrg/action_repo@1.0.0)
token	String	true	GitHub token with permission to read all specified repos
path	String	false (default: .github/actions)	Path to folder under which copies of all repositories will be loaded

Outputs

This action has no output

Use Cases

Here are some of the use cases on how to use this action.

Use Case 1

Load a couple of actions to be used in the following steps. Specify multiple repos in a multi-line yaml string. Token must be supplied that can read ALL the actions' repos.

The action loads each repo into a subfolder of the default location: .github/actions. That subfolder will be named using the name of the repository itself.

- name: preload-local-actions ## Executes preload-local-actions
  uses: ./.github/actions/preload-local-actions
  with:
      repository: |
          ownerOrOrg/repo_for_action1@v1.3.5
          ornderOrOrg/repo_for_action2@v1.0.9
      token: ${{ secrets.MY_READONLY_PAT }}

Use Case 2

Load one action to be used in the following steps. Specify single repos in a standard yaml string. Token must be supplied that can read the action's repo.

- name: preload-local-actions ## Executes preload-local-actions
  uses: ./.github/actions/preload-local-actions
  with:
      repository: 'ownerOrOrg/repo_for_action1@v1.3.5'
      token: ${{ secrets.MY_READONLY_PAT }}

Use Case 3

Load some actions to be used in the following steps specifying a specific folder to receive the loaded repo contents. As usual, specify multiple repos in a multi-line yaml string. Token must be supplied that can read ALL the actions' repos.

The action loads each repo into a subfolder of the specified path. That subfolder will be named using the name of the repository itself.

- name: preload-local-actions ## Executes preload-local-actions
  uses: ./.github/actions/preload-local-actions
  with:
      repository: |
          ownerOrOrg/repo_for_action1@v1.3.5
          ownerOrOrg/repo_for_action2@v1.0.9
      token: ${{ secrets.MY_READONLY_PAT }}
      path: './.github/special_action_repos'

Tests

.github/workflows/test.yml in this repo will run test cases to verify the health of this action.

.github/workflows/build-test-lint.yml in this repo will use yarn to install, lint, test and build the typescript.

Local Development

Dependencies

Before getting started, make sure to install Node and then install yarn.

Next, install the app's dependencies by running yarn install. To build the app, simply run yarn build.

Contributing

Interested in contributing to the project? Check out our Contributing Guidelines.