cockroachdb/actions

Reusable GitHub Actions and workflows for CockroachDB projects.

Actions

autotag-from-changelog

Creates git tags from CHANGELOG.md versions. Fails only when there is content under [Unreleased] and the previous release version tag does not yet exist; otherwise it succeeds even if [Unreleased] contains entries.

Usage:

- uses: cockroachdb/actions/autotag-from-changelog@v1

Inputs:

Name	Default	Description
changelog-path	CHANGELOG.md	Path to the changelog file

Required permissions:

permissions:
  contents: write

changelog-check

Validates that CHANGELOG.md follows the Keep a Changelog standard. Ensures proper changelog structure, version ordering, and detects breaking changes to enable automated version bump determination.

Usage:

- uses: cockroachdb/actions/changelog-check@v1
  with:
    check-mode: diff
    base-ref: ${{ github.event.pull_request.base.ref }}

Inputs:

Name	Default	Description
changelog-path	CHANGELOG.md	Path to the changelog file
validation-depth	1	How many changelog entries to validate starting from the most recent
check-mode	unreleased	Check mode for breaking change detection: unreleased (entire Unreleased section) or diff (PR changes only). Does not affect format/version validation, which always runs.
base-ref	''	Required when check-mode is diff. The base git ref to compare against for detecting breaking changes in the diff only (e.g., main, or github.event.pull_request.base.ref in PRs). Not needed for unreleased mode.

Outputs:

Name	Description
is_valid	Whether the CHANGELOG format and version ordering are valid
has_breaking	Whether breaking changes were detected

Features:

• Validates CHANGELOG.md format using Keep a Changelog standard
• Checks that versions are in descending order (newest first)
• Checks that release dates are in descending order
• Detects breaking changes via two methods:
  • Entries prefixed with Breaking Change: in any section
  • Presence of a ### Removed section header
• Supports checking entire Unreleased section or only PR diff

release-version-extract

Extracts the current version from CHANGELOG.md and determines the next version based on unreleased changes. Analyzes changelog entries to automatically determine whether a major, minor, or patch version bump is needed.

Usage:

- uses: cockroachdb/actions/release-version-extract@v1
  id: version
- run: echo "Next version will be ${{ steps.version.outputs.next_version }}"

Inputs:

Name	Default	Description
changelog-path	CHANGELOG.md	Path to the changelog file

Outputs:

Name	Description
current_version	Current latest released version (empty if no releases)
next_version	Suggested next version based on unreleased changes
bump_type	Type of version bump (major/minor/patch/initial, or empty if no changes)
has_unreleased	Whether there are unreleased changes (true/false)

Features:

• Automatically determines version bump type from changelog entries
• Detects major bumps when breaking changes are present (lines prefixed with Breaking Change: or ### Removed section)
• Handles initial releases (first release → 0.1.0)
• Returns empty bump_type when there are no unreleased changes
• Follows semantic versioning principles

Development

Run all tests locally:

./test.sh

Tests also run automatically on pull requests via CI.