Local Action Debugger

Run custom GitHub Actions locally and test them in Visual Studio Code!

This command-line tool emulates some basic functionality of the GitHub Actions Toolkit so that custom actions can be run directly on your workstation.

Note

This tool currently only supports JavaScript and TypeScript actions!

The following table tracks the versions of the GitHub Actions Toolkit that are currently implemented by this tool.

Package	Version
@actions/artifact	5.0.2
@actions/cache	5.0.3
@actions/core	2.0.2
@actions/github	7.0.0

Changelog

See the CHANGELOG for a complete list of changes.

Node.js Version Support

This tool is currently tested against Node.js versions 22 and 24. It is not guaranteed to work with other versions at this time.

Package Manager Support

npm Support

This tool is designed primarily for use with npm and npx. It is recommended to use npm for managing actions you wish to test with this tool.

pnpm Support

This tool ships with experimental support for pnpm. If you encounter any issues, please file an issue.

Some caveats to this support are listed below.

• This tool does not support CommonJS actions using pnpm.

yarn Support

This tool ships with experimental support for yarn. If you encounter any issues, please file an issue.

Some caveats to this support are listed below.

• The @github/local-action package should be run using yarn dlx @github/local-action instead of yarn local-action.
• This tool does not support CommonJS actions using yarn.

Prerequisites

Installed Tools

• Node.js and npm

Action Structure

For JavaScript and TypeScript actions, your code should follow the format of the corresponding template repository.

• actions/javascript-action
• actions/typescript-action

Specifically, there should be a separation between the entrypoint used by GitHub Actions when invoking your code, and the actual logic of your action. For example:

Entrypoint: index.ts

This is what is invoked by GitHub Actions when your action is run.

/**
 * This file is the entrypoint for the action
 */
import { run } from './main'

// It calls the actual logic of the action
run()

Logic: main.ts

This is the actual implementation of your action. It is called by the entrypoint.

import * as core from '@actions/core'
import { wait } from './wait'

/**
 * This file is the actual logic of the action
 * @returns {Promise<void>} Resolves when the action is complete
 */
export async function run(): Promise<void> {
  // ...
}

Transpiled Actions

Depending on how you build your JavaScript/TypeScript actions, you may do one of the following when preparing for release:

• Commit the node_modules directory to your repository
• Transpile your code and dependencies using tools like tsc, @vercel/ncc, or rollup

This tool supports non-transpiled action code only. This is because it uses quibble to override GitHub Actions Toolkit dependencies (e.g @actions/core). In transpiled code, this simply doesn't work.

For example, if you have a TypeScript action that follows the same format as the template, you would have both src and dist directories in your repository. The dist directory contains the transpiled code with any dependencies included. When running this utility, you will want to target the code files in the src directory instead (including the dependencies this tool wants to replace). This has the added benefit of being able to hook into debugging utilities in your IDE 🎉

For additional information about transpiled action code, see Commit, tag, and push your action to GitHub.

Installation

Option 1: Install from npm

1. Install via npm

   npm i -g @github/local-action
   

Option 2: Clone this Repository

1. Clone this repository locally

   git clone https://github.com/github/local-action.git
   

2. Install dependencies

   npm ci
   

3. Install via npm

   npm i -g .
   

   Alternatively, you can link the package if you want to make code changes

   npm link .
   

Commands

local-action

Option	Description
-h, --help	Display help information
-V, --version	Display version information

local-action run <path> <logic entrypoint> <dotenv file> [--pre <pre entrypoint>] [--post <post entrypoint>]

Argument	Description
path	Path to the local action directory
	Example: /path/to/action.yml
logic entrypoint	Action logic entrypoint (relative to action directory)
	Example: src/main.ts
dotenv file	Path to the local .env file for action inputs
	Example: /path/to/.env
	See the example .env.example
--pre <pre entrypoint>	(Optional) pre command entrypoint (relative to action directory)
	Example: pre/main.ts
--post <post entrypoint>	(Optional) post command entrypoint (relative to action directory)
	Example: post/main.ts

Examples:

local-action run /path/to/typescript-action src/main.ts .env --pre pre/main.ts --post post/main.ts

# The `run` action is invoked by default as well
local-action /path/to/typescript-action src/main.ts .env --pre pre/main.ts --post post/main.ts

Output

$ local-action run /path/to/typescript-action src/main.ts .env --pre pre/main.ts --post post/main.ts
     _        _   _               ____       _
    / \   ___| |_(_) ___  _ __   |  _ \  ___| |__  _   _  __ _  __ _  ___ _ __
   / _ \ / __| __| |/ _ \| '_ \  | | | |/ _ \ '_ \| | | |/ _` |/ _` |/ _ \ '__|
  / ___ \ (__| |_| | (_) | | | | | |_| |  __/ |_) | |_| | (_| | (_| |  __/ |
 /_/   \_\___|\__|_|\___/|_| |_| |____/ \___|_.__/ \__,_|\__, |\__, |\___|_|
                                                         |___/ |___/
================================================================================
                                 Configuration
================================================================================

┌─────────┬────────────────────┬───────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ (index) │       Field        │                  Value                    │
├─────────┼────────────────────┼───────────────────────────────────────────┤
│    0    │   'Action Path'    │       '/path/to/typescript-action'        │
│    1    │    'Entrypoint'    │ '/path/to/typescript-action/src/main.ts'  │
│    2    │ 'Environment File' │   '/path/to/local-action-debugger/.env'   │
└─────────┴────────────────────┴───────────────────────────────────────────┘

================================================================================
                                Action Metadata
================================================================================

┌─────────┬────────────────┬───────────────────────────────┐
│ (index) │     Input      │          Description          │
├─────────┼────────────────┼───────────────────────────────┤
│    0    │ 'milliseconds' │ 'Your input description here' │
└─────────┴────────────────┴───────────────────────────────┘

┌─────────┬────────┬────────────────────────────────┐
│ (index) │ Output │          Description           │
├─────────┼────────┼────────────────────────────────┤
│    0    │ 'time' │ 'Your output description here' │
└─────────┴────────┴────────────────────────────────┘

================================================================================
                                 Running Action
================================================================================

(TypeScript) TSConfig Requirements

If you are testing TypeScript actions, there are a few settings that must be configured in your tsconfig.json file (either explicitly or via their default values).

Property	Required Value
allowJs	false

Troubleshooting

Possible errors that can arise from not having allowJs: false:

• TypeError [ERR_INVALID_URL_SCHEME]: The URL must be of scheme file from tsx when trying to run npx @github/local-action.

Features

The following list links to documentation on how to use various features of the local-action tool.

• Supported Functionality
• Debugging in Visual Studio Code
• Create a Job Summary