Reading changelog - automate release bodies

[joepio]

Hi there! Thanks for creating and maintaining this.

I recently came across this github action: create-gh-release-action, which parses the CHANGELOG.md file and uses that to create a body for the release.

Might be cool this action supports a similar thing.

Users can also manually set it up using changelog-reader:

      - name: Get Changelog Entry
        id: changelog_reader
        uses: mindsers/changelog-reader-action@v2
        with:
          validation_depth: 10
          version: ${{ steps.tag_name.outputs.current_version }}
          path: ./CHANGELOG.md
      - name: Create/update release
        uses: ncipollo/release-action@v1
        with:
          # This pulls from the "Get Changelog Entry" step above, referencing it's ID to get its outputs object.
          # See this blog post for more info: https://jasonet.co/posts/new-features-of-github-actions/#passing-data-to-future-steps
          tag: ${{ steps.changelog_reader.outputs.version }}
          name: Release ${{ steps.changelog_reader.outputs.version }}
          body: ${{ steps.changelog_reader.outputs.changes }}
          prerelease: ${{ steps.changelog_reader.outputs.status == 'prereleased' }}
          draft: ${{ steps.changelog_reader.outputs.status == 'unreleased' }}
          allowUpdates: true
          token: ${{ secrets.GITHUB_TOKEN }}

But it would be even better if this was natively supported by this action.

[xendarboh]

I came across this issue while automating release bodies with a changelog generated from git commits since previous release. Thought I'd share my experience and the resulting workflow.

In my case, I found the tauri-action configuration flexibility sufficient, as there are many compatible changelog-producing actions or tools. If anything, perhaps a suggestion for this issue is a publish-to-auto-release-tag-with-changelog.yml documentation example. tauri-action works great!

For the following workflow, pushed git tags trigger releases while git-cliff generates the changelog for release body from latest (unreleased) commits.

Resulting workflow file

# - remove version from `tauri.conf.json` so it's managed by `Cargo.toml`
# - create git-cliff's `cliff.toml` config file with `git cliff --init`
name: "publish"

on:
  push:
    tags:
      - "v*"

# On each push of a `v*` git tag it will create or update a GitHub release with a generated changelog, build your app, and upload the artifacts to the release.

jobs:
  publish-tauri:
    permissions:
      contents: write
    strategy:
      fail-fast: false
      matrix:
        include:
          - platform: "macos-latest" # for Arm based macs (M1 and above).
            args: "--target aarch64-apple-darwin"
          - platform: "macos-latest" # for Intel based macs.
            args: "--target x86_64-apple-darwin"
          - platform: "ubuntu-22.04" # for Tauri v1 you could replace this with ubuntu-20.04.
            args: ""
          - platform: "windows-latest"
            args: ""

    runs-on: ${{ matrix.platform }}
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v4
        with:
          fetch-depth: 0
          fetch-tags: true

      - name: setup node
        uses: actions/setup-node@v4
        with:
          node-version: lts/*

      - name: install Rust stable
        uses: dtolnay/rust-toolchain@stable
        with:
          # Those targets are only used on macos runners so it's in an `if` to slightly speed up windows and linux builds.
          targets: ${{ matrix.platform == 'macos-latest' && 'aarch64-apple-darwin,x86_64-apple-darwin' || '' }}

      - name: install dependencies (ubuntu only)
        if: matrix.platform == 'ubuntu-22.04' # This must match the platform value defined above.
        run: |
          sudo apt-get update
          sudo apt-get install -y libwebkit2gtk-4.0-dev libwebkit2gtk-4.1-dev libappindicator3-dev librsvg2-dev patchelf
        # webkitgtk 4.0 is for Tauri v1 - webkitgtk 4.1 is for Tauri v2.
        # You can remove the one that doesn't apply to your app to speed up the workflow a bit.

      - name: install frontend dependencies
        run: npm install # change this to npm, pnpm or bun depending on which one you use.

      - name: Extract version from tag
        run: echo "VERSION=${GITHUB_REF#refs/tags/v}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
        shell: bash

      # for cross-platform build compat, use perl
      - name: Update the Tauri App version with tag version
        run: |
          perl -pi -e 's/^version = ".*"/version = "${{ env.VERSION }}"/' src-tauri/Cargo.toml

      - name: install git-cliff
        run: cargo install git-cliff || true

      - name: generate changelog
        id: changelog
        run: |
          echo 'changelog<<EOF' >> $GITHUB_OUTPUT
          git-cliff --latest --strip all --use-branch-tags >> $GITHUB_OUTPUT
          echo 'EOF' >> $GITHUB_OUTPUT

      - uses: tauri-apps/tauri-action@v0
        env:
          GITHUB_TOKEN: ${{ secrets.GITHUB_TOKEN }}
        with:
          tagName: v${{ env.VERSION }}
          releaseName: v${{ env.VERSION }}
          releaseBody: "${{ steps.changelog.outputs.changelog }}"
          releaseDraft: true
          prerelease: true
          args: ${{ matrix.args }}

Changes to examples/publish-to-auto-release.yml:

 name: "publish"
 
 on:
   push:
-    branches:
-      - release
+    tags:
+      - "v*"
 
 # This is the example from the readme.
 # On each push to the `release` branch it will create or update a GitHub release, build your app, and upload the artifacts to the release.
@@ -28,6 +29,9 @@ jobs:
     runs-on: ${{ matrix.platform }}
     steps:
       - uses: actions/checkout@v4
+        with:
+          fetch-depth: 0
+          fetch-tags: true
 
       - name: setup node
         uses: actions/setup-node@v4
@@ -49,15 +53,34 @@ jobs:
         # You can remove the one that doesn't apply to your app to speed up the workflow a bit.
 
       - name: install frontend dependencies
         run: yarn install # change this to npm, pnpm or bun depending on which one you use.
+
+      - name: Extract version from tag
+        run: echo "VERSION=${GITHUB_REF#refs/tags/v}" >> $GITHUB_ENV
+        shell: bash
+
+      # for cross-platform build compat, use perl
+      - name: Update the Tauri App version with tag version
+        run: |
+          perl -pi -e 's/^version = ".*"/version = "${{ env.VERSION }}"/' src-tauri/Cargo.toml
+
+      - name: install git-cliff
+        run: cargo install git-cliff || true
+
+      - name: generate changelog
+        id: changelog
+        run: |
+          echo 'changelog<<EOF' >> $GITHUB_OUTPUT
+          git-cliff --latest --strip all --use-branch-tags >> $GITHUB_OUTPUT
+          echo 'EOF' >> $GITHUB_OUTPUT
 
       - uses: tauri-apps/tauri-action@v0
         env:
           GITHUB_TOKEN: ${{ secrets.GITHUB_TOKEN }}
         with:
-          tagName: app-v__VERSION__ # the action automatically replaces \_\_VERSION\_\_ with the app version.
-          releaseName: "App v__VERSION__"
-          releaseBody: "See the assets to download this version and install."
+          tagName: v${{ env.VERSION }}
+          releaseName: v${{ env.VERSION }}
+          releaseBody: "${{ steps.changelog.outputs.changelog }}"
           releaseDraft: true
           args: ${{ matrix.args }}