DEPLOY_TO_QA.md

This is a GitHub action we used on several projects to allow our QA team to push changes from dev to qa branch.

Minimal version

The shorter version does the following:

• Updates the patch version in package.json on dev
• Creates new tag
• Pushes updated files to dev
• Pushes evertything from dev to qa

Fancier version

The second version does all that, but adds one more thing:

• Writes package version to version.js file

We then console.log this version on the client. This allows us to open console and be certain which version are we looking at.

import { VERSION } from './version.js';

console.log(`Version: ${VERSION}`);

You'll need to update VERSION_FILE_PATH to point to version.js (you can also switch to .ts)

Notes

• Action needs to be on your default branch
• You can run it manually by selecting it in the actions list and then clicking on "Run workflow" button:
• You can use different branch than dev just swap it in the yaml file (screenshot above shows main to qa action).
• Make sure you leave fetch-depth: '0'. Without it the action won't be able to rebase. I lost a few hours because of this, but luckily I found this Stack Overflow thread.

fancy-deploy-to-qa.yaml

name: Deploy from DEV to QA

env:
  VERSION_FILE_PATH: ./src/js/VERSION_FILE_PATH

on: workflow_dispatch

jobs:
  deploy-dev-to-qa:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v3
        with:
          ref: 'dev'
          fetch-depth: '0'
      - name: Update version and deploy to qa branch
        run: |
          # Init
          git config user.name "GitHub Actions"
          git config user.email "action@github.com"

          # Increase version in package.json
          APP_VERSION=$(npm --no-git-tag-version version patch)

          # Write version to a JS file
          echo "/* DO NOT MAKE EDITS IN THIS FILE!
          * This file is automatically by a GitHub action and any changes will be overwritten.
          * Check .github/workflows/deploy-to-qa.yaml */
          export const VERSION = '$APP_VERSION';" > $VERSION_FILE_PATH

          # Commit files and create tag
          git add $VERSION_FILE_PATH
          git commit ./package.json ./package-lock.json $VERSION_FILE_PATH -m "Increase version to $APP_VERSION"
          git tag $APP_VERSION

          # Push tag and version update
          git push origin dev
          git push origin $APP_VERSION

          # Finally push everything from dev to qa
          git fetch origin qa
          git checkout qa
          git pull --rebase origin dev
          git push origin qa

simple-deploy-to-qa.yaml

name: Deploy from DEV to QA

on: workflow_dispatch

jobs:
  deploy-dev-to-qa:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v3
        with:
          ref: 'dev'
          fetch-depth: '0'
      - name: Update version and deploy to qa branch
        run: |
          # Init
          git config user.name "GitHub Actions"
          git config user.email "action@github.com"

          # Increase version in package.json
          APP_VERSION=$(npm version patch)

          # Push tag and version update
          git push origin dev
          git push origin $APP_VERSION

          # Push everything from dev to qa
          git fetch origin qa
          git checkout qa
          git pull --rebase origin dev
          git push origin qa