This repository is based on GitHub's unmaintained actions/create-release action. We have updated it to use GitHub's current APIs and will be continuing to do so for the foreseeable future.

This GitHub Action (written in JavaScript) wraps the GitHub Release API, specifically the Create a Release endpoint, to allow you to leverage GitHub Actions to create releases.

Create a workflow .yml file in your .github/workflows directory. An example workflow is available below. For more information, reference the GitHub Help Documentation for Creating a workflow file.

For more information on these inputs, see the API Documentation

• tag_name: The name of the tag for this release
• release_name: The name of the release
• body: Text describing the contents of the release. Optional, and not needed if using body_path.
• body_path: A file with contents describing the release. Optional, and not needed if using body.
• draft: true to create a draft (unpublished) release, false to create a published one. Default: false
• prerelease: true to identify the release as a prerelease. false to identify the release as a full release. Default: false
• commitish : Any branch or commit SHA the Git tag is created from, unused if the Git tag already exists. Default: SHA of current commit
• owner: The name of the owner of the repo. Used to identify the owner of the repository. Used when cutting releases for external repositories. Default: Current owner
• repo: The name of the repository. Used to identify the repository on which to release. Used when cutting releases for external repositories. Default: Current repository

The body_path is valuable for dynamically creating a .md within code commits and even within the Github Action steps leading up to the create-release.

For more information on these outputs, see the API Documentation for an example of what these outputs look like

• id: The release ID
• html_url: The URL users can navigate to in order to view the release. i.e. https://github.com/octocat/Hello-World/releases/v1.0.0
• upload_url: The URL for uploading assets to the release, which could be used by GitHub Actions for additional uses, for example the @actions/upload-release-asset GitHub Action

On every push to a tag matching the pattern v*, create a release:

on:
  push:
    # Sequence of patterns matched against refs/tags
    tags:
      - 'v*' # Push events to matching v*, i.e. v1.0, v20.15.10

name: Create Release

jobs:
  build:
    name: Create Release
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - name: Checkout code
        uses: actions/checkout@v2
      - name: Create Release
        id: create_release
        uses: actions/create-release@v1
        env:
          GITHUB_TOKEN: ${{ secrets.GITHUB_TOKEN }} # This token is provided by Actions, you do not need to create your own token
        with:
          tag_name: ${{ github.ref }}
          release_name: Release ${{ github.ref }}
          body: |
            Changes in this Release
            - First Change
            - Second Change
          draft: false
          prerelease: false

This will create a Release, as well as a release event, which could be handled by a third party service, or by GitHub Actions for additional uses, for example the @actions/upload-release-asset GitHub Action. This uses the GITHUB_TOKEN provided by the virtual environment, so no new token is needed.

We would love you to contribute to @actions/create-release, pull requests are welcome! Please see the CONTRIBUTING.md for more information.

The scripts and documentation in this project are released under the MIT License