Rust Release Action

A GitHub Action to automate Rust crate releases. How it works:

• Automatically extracts the version from Cargo.toml (or use a custom version)
• Publishes crate to crates.io (optional)
• Creates a new tag and a GitHub release

This action tightly integrates with the Build Rust Artifact Action. This action will give you the additional:

• Automatically launches parallel jobs to attach pre-built binaries to a newly created release
  • for Windows, MacOs (x86_64 and aarch64) and Linux (x86_64 and aarch64)

Note: this action is currently limited to Rust projects that aren't using workspaces. If there is a single Cargo.toml file at the root of your project, it is good to go.

Jump to:

• installation
• inputs
• outputs
• full example

Installation

Add this action to your workflow by referencing it in your .github/workflows/*.yml file:

- uses: seaofvoices/rust-release-action@v1
  with:
    publish_crate: true
  env:
    CARGO_REGISTRY_TOKEN: ${{ secrets.CARGO_REGISTRY_TOKEN }}
    GITHUB_TOKEN: ${{ secrets.GITHUB_TOKEN }}

Inputs

Input	Description	Required	Default
release_tag	Version to release (e.g., v1.0.0 or 1.0.0). Auto-prefixes "v" if missing. Uses Cargo.toml version if empty	No	''
release_ref	Branch, tag or SHA to checkout	No	''
publish_crate	Whether to publish the crate to crates.io	No	true
cargo_token	Token for publishing to crates.io (required if publish_crate: true)	Required when publish_crate is true	-
github_token	GitHub token for creating releases	No	${{ github.token }}
package_name	Package name for build artifacts (uses package.name from Cargo.toml if empty)	No	''

Outputs

The action produces 2 output values that can be referenced in subsequent steps:

Output	Description
upload_url	The upload URL for the created GitHub release, useful for uploading additional assets
build_matrix	JSON build matrix for cross-platform compilation with os, name, artifact_name, cargo_target, and optional linker fields

The build_matrix output is meant to be used by the Build Rust Artifact Action. See the example below.

Example: Trigger a Full Release Manually

The following workflow configuration will create a button under the Actions tab of your repository. You will be able to click and configure the release. Triggering the workflow will:

• Create a new tag 🏷️
• Create a new release 🚢
• Automatically attach pre-built binaries to the release 🚀

Make sure to add a valid CARGO_REGISTRY_TOKEN value to your repository's secrets.

In a .github/workflows/release.yml file:

name: Release

on:
  workflow_dispatch:
    inputs:
      release_tag:
        description: 'The version to release (uses Cargo.toml if empty)'
        default: ''
        type: string

      release_ref:
        description: 'The branch, tag or SHA to checkout (default to latest)'
        default: ''
        type: string

permissions:
  contents: write

jobs:
  create-release:
    name: Publish darklua crate
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest

    outputs:
      upload_url: ${{ steps.create.outputs.upload_url }}
      build_matrix: ${{ steps.create.outputs.build_matrix }}

    steps:
      - name: Release specific version
        id: create
        uses: seaofvoices/rust-release-action@v1
        with:
          release_tag: ${{ inputs.release_tag }}
          release_ref: ${{ inputs.release_ref }}
          publish_crate: true
          cargo_token: ${{ secrets.CARGO_REGISTRY_TOKEN }}

  build-artifacts:
    needs: create-release

    strategy:
      fail-fast: false
      matrix:
        include: ${{ fromJson(needs.create-release.outputs.build_matrix) }}

    name: Build (${{ matrix.artifact-name }})
    runs-on: ${{ matrix.os }}

    steps:
      - name: Build artifact
        id: create_release
        uses: seaofvoices/rust-build-artifact-action@v1
        with:
          release_ref: ${{ inputs.release_ref }}
          upload_url: ${{ needs.create-release.outputs.upload_url }}
          package_name: ${{ matrix.name }}
          artifact_name: ${{ matrix.artifact_name }}
          cargo_target: ${{ matrix.name }}
          linker: ${{ matrix.linker }}

License

This project is available under the MIT license. See LICENSE.txt for details.