This GitHub Action sorts through a given repository's tags and returns the greatest according to the rules of semantic versioning on its tag output, along with a clean semver stripped of any prefix on its current output. This action is primarily intended as a utility for use in release automation workflows.

Obtaining version increments

The next-* outputs yield a semver that has a corresponding increment over the current output (e.g., if current is 1.0.0 then next-minor is 1.0.1).

Requesting a specific version bump

If a bump input is given (e.g., "minor" or "release"), the bump output yields the requested semver with respect to current.

Validating planned a version

When given a semver on the planned input, this action reports whether the given version is indeed greater than current on the planned-is-valid output.

In the steps of a job, specify the following:

- name: Repo SemVer
  uses: lhstrh/[email protected]
  id: repo-semver
  with:
    bump: patch

You can then use the output in a subsequent step:

- name: Do something with the found tag
  run: |
    echo "The greatest tag is: ${{ steps.repo-semver.outputs.tag }}"
    echo "The current version is: ${{ steps.repo-semver.outputs.current }}"
    echo "The next major release is: ${{ steps.repo-semver.outputs.next-major }}"
    echo "The requested bump is: ${{ steps.repo-semver.outputs.bump }}"

Assuming the greatest tag is v3.14.0, this will give the following output:

The greatest tag is: v3.14.0
The current version is: 3.14.0
The next major release is: 4.0.0
The requested bump is: 3.14.1

Note that the tag output is "as-is", including any prefix the semver might have. All other outputs, including current, bump, and next-* are not prefixed even if the tag has one.

• repo If specified, this repository is checked out by the action. By default, no checkout occurs.
• path Location to find the repository checkout. By default, this is $github.workspace.
• bump If specified, the bump output will reflect the given version increment with respect to current.
• override If specified, the current output will be set equal to override, and all other outputs are computed with respect to it (instead of using the greatest tag found in the repository). A given override must be a valid semantic version number.
• planned If this is a valid semver greater than the current output, the valid-planned output is true.
• build If specified, the next-build output will be generated featuring this string (and remain empty otherwise).
• prerelease If specified, the next-prerelease output will be generated featuring this string (and remain empty otherwise).

• tag The greatest tag found that qualifies as a semver string (or empty if none was found).
• prefix The prefix used in the found tag (or empty if none was used).
• current The version corresponding the the tag output, stripped of any prefix. Defaults to 0.0.0 if tag is empty.
• bump The version increment relative to current as specified in the bump input (or empty if none was given).
• next-prerelease The smallest prerelease increment relative to the current output.
• next-patch The smallest patch increment relative current.
• next-minor The smallest minor increment relative to current.
• next-major The smallest major increment relative to current.
• next-release The smallest release increment relative to current.
• next-build A build increment relative to current.
• planned-is-valid True if the planned input is a valid semver greater than the current output.

• (prerelease) If current is 1.0.0, then next-prerelease is 1.0.0-1.
• (patch) If current is 1.0.0, then next-patch is 1.0.1.
• (minor) If current is 1.0.0, then next-minor is 1.1.0.
• (major) If current is 1.0.0, then next-major is 2.0.0.
• (release) If current is 1.0.0-beta, then next-release is 1.0.0.
• (build) If current is 1.0.0-beta and the build input is 1, then next-build is 1.0.0-beta 1.

This action makes use of the semver shell utility written by François Saint-Jacques.