With numbers running into the tens of millions both for users and code repositories, connecting communities and libraries made GitHub an open-source favorite for software development. Now the platform operator wants to run those applications as well.
At last week’s annual GitHub Universe event for developers, executives made their pitch for automating the development process with a new assembly of tools called GitHub ActionsOpens a new window , a suite that facilitates everything from sending pull requests and publishing updates to creating continuous development pipelines and pushing applications to the cloud.
The suite lets users create workflows from ideation to deployment, without having to commit computational resources to test, release and update the resulting applications. Github’s goal is to bring the same continuous-integration/continuous-deployment the platform facilitates for software development to the administration and management of workflow processes and development cycles.
GitHub Cuts Laborious Steps
In stepping beyond its traditional role of conduit, GitHub is conforming with the designs of its soon-to-be parent, operating systems giant Microsoft. In June, Microsoft announced the purchase of the platform, another move in its mission to remake the business into a provider of cloud services. Its $7.5 billion GitHub acquisition is fundamental in that shift.
GitHub Actions lets users pair tools with processes, either sourced from public repositories or from custom applications in Docker containers, written in any language and on any platform. They can integrate them into code repositories for faster builds, tests and deployments, including in multi-cloud environments. And they can automatically share updates with the open-source community.
At the annual event in San Francisco, officials said that the Actions suite is meant to liberate users from the repetitive processes around branching and publishing their augmentations to reference libraries, some 96 million of which can be accessed on GitHub. Hosted libraries will provide a source of the code instructions with which users can automate their development processes.
Actions are portions of code that follow on from the events that take place on GitHub, including when applications are published, amended, tested and deployed. The Actions toolkit spares developers the tedium of integrating code from disparate repositories and manually executing commands to publish their work, or when testing and deploying applications.
Because they are run from tip-to-tail in Docker containers, individual processes can be linked and integrated using Docker files. Developers can chain as many containers is necessary and trigger workflows based on event, like when updates are published, on the site. Meanwhile, or if containers aren’t preferred, users can create and customize workflow processes with image editors: The initial release features 26 trigger events and 450 sample actions that flow on from them.
Beta Testing Reveals Partner Potential
GitHub says the Actions tools are being beta tested with users in order to fill that palette ahead of general release, citing a host of use-cases that have resulted from pre-launch partnering with developers, user-communities and enterprises.
Among them:
Flic:Opens a new window A Bluetooth-enabled widget that lets users initiate apps and control devices. Using Flic, developers can set in motion automated workflows with GitHub Actions tools with the touch of a button.
Pulami:Opens a new window An open-source software development kit that lets users create cloud applications and infrastructures across platforms and in any coding language. Using Pulami with GitHub Actions lets developers deploy their applications straight from GitHub and with insights into all phases of continuous development.
Netifly:Opens a new window A management kit for web projects. GitHub Actions lets Netifly users update and integrate the applications they create in GitHub depositories for global deployment on multiple sites with automatic HTTPS updates.
Other featured uses, including one from Microsoft Azure, showcased the automation of repetitive tasks, such as updates publishing, and the potential for easing the orchestration headaches associated with the use of containers across multiple development paths.
Compliance-free formatting and development, as well as the toolkit’s facilitation of easier separation and testing of features releases and code deployments also earned a mention.
While general release is some months away, social media reaction in the development community, including 31 million members who use GitHub, is largely positive, and developers are echoing company sentiments about the revolutionary potential of running all their applications development, testing and deployments on the platform.