What is @actions/artifact?
@actions/artifact is an npm package designed for use with GitHub Actions. It allows you to upload and download build artifacts, which can be useful for sharing data between jobs in a workflow or for persisting data after a workflow completes.
What are @actions/artifact's main functionalities?
Upload Artifacts
This feature allows you to upload files as artifacts. The code sample demonstrates how to create an artifact client, specify the files to be uploaded, and then upload them.
const artifact = require('@actions/artifact');
const artifactClient = artifact.create();
const artifactName = 'my-artifact';
const files = ['path/to/file1', 'path/to/file2'];
const rootDirectory = 'path/to';
const options = { continueOnError: false };
artifactClient.uploadArtifact(artifactName, files, rootDirectory, options).then(response => {
console.log(`Artifact ${response.artifactName} has been successfully uploaded!`);
}).catch(error => {
console.error(`Failed to upload artifact: ${error}`);
});
Download Artifacts
This feature allows you to download previously uploaded artifacts. The code sample demonstrates how to create an artifact client, specify the artifact to be downloaded, and then download it.
const artifact = require('@actions/artifact');
const artifactClient = artifact.create();
const artifactName = 'my-artifact';
const downloadPath = 'path/to/download';
artifactClient.downloadArtifact(artifactName, downloadPath).then(response => {
console.log(`Artifact ${response.artifactName} has been successfully downloaded to ${response.downloadPath}`);
}).catch(error => {
console.error(`Failed to download artifact: ${error}`);
});
List Artifacts
This feature allows you to list all artifacts for a given workflow run. The code sample demonstrates how to create an artifact client and list all artifacts.
const artifact = require('@actions/artifact');
const artifactClient = artifact.create();
artifactClient.listArtifacts().then(response => {
console.log('Artifacts:', response.artifacts);
}).catch(error => {
console.error(`Failed to list artifacts: ${error}`);
});
Other packages similar to @actions/artifact
azure-storage
The azure-storage package provides similar functionality for uploading and downloading files, but it is designed for use with Azure Blob Storage. Unlike @actions/artifact, which is specifically tailored for GitHub Actions, azure-storage is more general-purpose and can be used in a variety of contexts.
aws-sdk
The aws-sdk package offers comprehensive functionality for interacting with AWS services, including S3 for file storage. It provides similar capabilities for uploading and downloading files, but it is more complex and versatile, supporting a wide range of AWS services beyond just artifact management.
@actions/artifact
Interact programmatically with Actions Artifacts.
This is the core library that powers the @actions/upload-artifact
and @actions/download-artifact
actions.
v2 - What's New
[!IMPORTANT]
@actions/artifact v2+, upload-artifact@v4+, and download-artifact@v4+ are not currently supported on GHES yet. The previous version of this package can be found at this tag and on npm.
The release of @actions/artifact@v2
(including upload-artifact@v4
and download-artifact@v4
) are major changes to the backend architecture of Artifacts. They have numerous performance and behavioral improvements.
Improvements
- All upload and download operations are much quicker, up to 80% faster download times and 96% faster upload times in worst case scenarios.
- Once uploaded, an Artifact ID is returned and Artifacts are immediately available in the UI and REST API. Previously, you would have to wait for the run to be completed before an ID was available or any APIs could be utilized.
- Artifacts can now be downloaded and deleted from the UI before the entire workflow run finishes.
- The contents of an Artifact are uploaded together into an immutable archive. They cannot be altered by subsequent jobs. Both of these factors help reduce the possibility of accidentally corrupting Artifact files. (Digest/integrity hash coming soon in the API!)
- This library (and
actions/download-artifact
) now support downloading Artifacts from other repositories and runs if a GITHUB_TOKEN
with sufficient actions:read
permissions are provided.
Breaking changes
-
Firewall rules required for self-hosted runners.
If you are using self-hosted runners behind a firewall, you must have flows open to Actions endpoints. If you cannot use wildcard rules for your firewall, see the GitHub meta endpoint for specific endpoints.
e.g.
curl https://api.github.com/meta | jq .domains.actions
-
Uploading to the same named Artifact multiple times.
Due to how Artifacts are created in this new version, it is no longer possible to upload to the same named Artifact multiple times. You must either split the uploads into multiple Artifacts with different names, or only upload once.
-
Limit of Artifacts for an individual job.
Each job in a workflow run now has a limit of 10 artifacts.
Quick Start
Install the package:
npm i @actions/artifact
Import the module:
import {DefaultArtifactClient} from '@actions/artifact'
const {DefaultArtifactClient} = require('@actions/artifact')
Then instantiate:
const artifact = new DefaultArtifactClient()
ℹ️ For a comprehensive list of classes, interfaces, functions and more, see the generated documentation.
Examples
Upload and Download
The most basic scenario is uploading one or more files to an Artifact, then downloading that Artifact. Downloads are based on the Artifact ID, which can be obtained in the response of uploadArtifact
, getArtifact
, listArtifacts
or via the REST API.
const {id, size} = await artifact.uploadArtifact(
'my-artifact',
['/absolute/path/file1.txt', './relative/file2.txt'],
{
retentionDays: 10
}
)
console.log(`Created artifact with id: ${id} (bytes: ${size}`)
const {downloadPath} = await artifact.downloadArtifact(id, {
path: '/tmp/dst/path',
})
console.log(`Downloaded artifact ${id} to: ${downloadPath}`)
Delete an Artifact
To delete an artifact, all you need is the name.
const {id} = await artifact.deleteArtifact(
'my-artifact'
)
console.log(`Deleted Artifact ID '${id}'`)
It also supports options to delete from other repos/runs given a github token with actions:write
permissions on the target repository is supplied.
const findBy = {
token: process.env['GITHUB_TOKEN'],
workflowRunId: 123,
repositoryOwner: 'actions',
repositoryName: 'toolkit'
}
const {id} = await artifact.deleteArtifact(
'my-artifact',
{ findBy }
)
console.log(`Deleted Artifact ID '${id}' from ${findBy.repositoryOwner}/ ${findBy.repositoryName}`)
Downloading from other workflow runs or repos
It may be useful to download Artifacts from other workflow runs, or even other repositories. By default, the permissions are scoped so they can only download Artifacts within the current workflow run. To elevate permissions for this scenario, you must specify options.findBy
to downloadArtifact
.
const findBy = {
token: process.env['GITHUB_TOKEN'],
workflowRunId: 123,
repositoryOwner: 'actions',
repositoryName: 'toolkit'
}
await artifact.downloadArtifact(1337, {
findBy
})
await artifact.getArtifact('my-artifact', {
findBy
})
await artifact.listArtifacts({
findBy
})
Speeding up large uploads
If you have large files that need to be uploaded (or file types that don't compress well), you may benefit from changing the compression level of the Artifact archive. NOTE: This is a tradeoff between artifact upload time and stored data size.
await artifact.uploadArtifact('my-massive-artifact', ['big_file.bin'], {
compressionLevel: 0
})
Additional Resources