DRelease

DRelease publishes a nightly prerelease with commit notes since the latest version tag. Each repository calling it keeps its own schedule, nightly tag, and release. It replaces the repeated notes-generation, tag-update, and publication steps used by GEMC, pygemc, and CLAS12 systems.

Use the root Action gemc/DRelease@main, the reusable workflow, or the local ./drelease command to generate the same notes. The initial version is upcoming in the next release; use main once the implementation is published there, or pin a reviewed commit SHA.

Prerequisites

• A Git repository checked out with full history and tags; in Actions, set fetch-depth: 0.
• A GitHub token with contents: write permission for publication.
• Node.js 24+ and Git for local use. The Bash launcher works on Linux and macOS; use WSL on Windows.

DRelease has no npm dependencies or build step. The Action supplies its own Node.js 24 runtime.

Quickstart: try it in GitHub Actions

Save this as .github/workflows/dev_release.yml in your repository:

name: Nightly Dev Release
on:
  schedule:
    - cron: '44 1 * * *'
  workflow_dispatch:
permissions:
  contents: write
concurrency:
  group: drelease-dev
  cancel-in-progress: false
jobs:
  dev-release:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v6
        with:
          fetch-depth: 0
          persist-credentials: false
      - uses: gemc/DRelease@main
        with:
          additional-notes: |
            Upcoming in the next release. This nightly build may change without notice.

Run the workflow from Actions → Nightly Dev Release → Run workflow, or let its schedule run nightly. The action creates or moves the dev tag to the selected commit and publishes a prerelease. Publication uses the GitHub API; no Git push or gh is needed. Each run includes its notes in the job summary.

The snippet matches GEMC's schedule and title. To preserve the other callers' settings:

• pygemc: use cron 34 1 * * * and set recreate-release: 'true'.
• CLAS12 systems: set title: CLAS12 Systems Dev Nightly and body-mode: file.

Normal updates preserve release assets. Recreating a release deletes its assets and changes its release ID. The notes file stays in the runner's working tree; no commit is created.

Reusable workflow

For a shorter caller, replace the dev-release job above with:

jobs:
  dev-release:
    uses: gemc/DRelease/.github/workflows/dev-release.yml@main
    with:
      title: Dev Nightly
      additional-notes: Upcoming in the next release.

The reusable workflow handles checkout, tag-specific concurrency, and publication. Keep the schedule, manual trigger, and contents: write permission in the caller. It accepts the release settings below; recreate-release is a boolean here, and ref defaults to the caller's commit. Pass a custom token through secrets: {token: '${{ secrets.RELEASE_TOKEN }}'} when needed. It exposes the same outputs as the Action; its notes path belongs to the remote job's runner.

Quickstart: preview locally

From the DRelease checkout, generate notes for another repository without fetching or publishing:

./drelease --working-directory /path/to/your/repository --notes-path /tmp/nightly-notes.md

The command prints the release body and writes the notes file. Use ./drelease --help for options. The local CLI always previews; release publication is performed by the Action's release mode.

Commit range

The default baseline is the most recently created version tag matching ^v?[0-9]+(\.[0-9]+)*$, excluding the moving nightly tag. Annotated tags use their tagger date; lightweight tags use their commit date. Selection is by date, not version number. Set tag-pattern for other naming schemes, or base-tag to choose an existing tag explicitly.

Notes contain every commit reachable from the selected ref whose committer timestamp is strictly after the baseline date, including merge commits. Displayed dates use UTC. The baseline commit and older commits brought in by a merge are excluded by their timestamps. With no matching tags, notes include the full reachable history. Shallow checkouts fail with instructions to obtain complete history.

since overrides the baseline date; until provides an inclusive upper bound. Both accept ISO 8601 dates or timestamps; values without a timezone use UTC. No fixed date needs updating after each version tag. Existing DEVMD_SINCE and DEVMD_UNTIL variables are replaced by these inputs.

Inputs

Input	Default	Purpose
mode	release	Publish a release, or notes to generate notes without network access.
working-directory	.	Checked-out repository to read.
token	${{ github.token }}	Token for publication; not used in notes mode.
tag	dev	Moving nightly tag; use a dedicated tag, never a stable release tag.
title	Dev Nightly	Release title.
ref	HEAD	Existing commit or branch in the checkout to release.
tag-pattern	Version pattern above	JavaScript regular expression matched against entire tag names.
base-tag	Automatic	Explicit baseline tag.
since	Baseline tag date	Override the start date.
until	No limit	Inclusive end date for the notes.
additional-notes	Empty	Extra Markdown before the commit list; supports multiline text.
additional-notes-file	Empty	Extra Markdown file relative to the checked-out repository.
notes-path	releases/dev.md	Generated notes file, relative to the repository or absolute.
body-mode	auto	Publish the generated section, or file for the entire notes file.
recreate-release	'false'	Set 'true' to delete and recreate an existing nightly release.

Notes replace the region between <!-- AUTO-DEVMD:START --> and <!-- AUTO-DEVMD:END -->, preserving text outside it. Files without markers get a new generated section appended. Malformed markers fail instead of overwriting content. Inline notes and notes read from a file are included before the commit list.

Outputs: base-tag, since, target-sha, notes-path (absolute), and release-url (release mode only).

Development

Like Callgrinder and ThreadScale, DRelease uses CommonJS modules under src/, thin Action and CLI entry points, and native Node tests under test/. Shared code implements notes generation and publication.

npm run check   # node --check on the entry points
npm test        # node --test; temporary repositories and mocked GitHub API responses

Simulate the Action locally with INPUT_* variables, as in the other projects:

INPUT_MODE=notes node src/main.js

That writes the default notes file in the current repository; use the CLI's --notes-path option to preview in a scratch path. Both test commands work offline, with no install step. See v1.0.0 release notes for the upcoming initial version.

DRelease