urlchecker-action

A GitHub action to collect and check URLs in a project (code and documentation). The action aims at detecting and reporting broken links.

How to use it?

A set of examples are included in the examples folder. A few detailed examples are also included below. Note that examples always reference the master branch, however you should change them to reference a release.

Example with Checkout

For most use cases, you will want to use the git repository that is being checked for a GitHub actions, and we do this by way of the actions/checkout action.

name: Check URLs

on: [push]

jobs:
  build:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest

    steps:
    - uses: actions/checkout@v3
    - name: urls-checker
      uses: urlstechie/urlchecker-action@master
      with:
        # A subfolder or path to navigate to in the present or cloned repository
        subfolder: docs

        # A comma-separated list of file types to cover in the URL checks
        file_types: .md,.py,.rst

        # Choose whether to include file with no URLs in the prints.
        print_all: false

        # The timeout seconds to provide to requests, defaults to 5 seconds
        timeout: 5

        # How many times to retry a failed request (each is logged, defaults to 1)
        retry_count: 3

        # A comma separated links to exclude during URL checks
        exclude_urls: https://github.com/SuperKogito/URLs-checker/issues/1,https://github.com/SuperKogito/URLs-checker/issues/2

        # A comma separated patterns to exclude during URL checks
        exclude_patterns: https://github.com/SuperKogito/Voice-based-gender-recognition/issues

        # choose if the force pass or not
        force_pass : true

Note that as of version 0.2.2, references to white_listed_* have been changed to exclude_* to be consistent with the include_* variables.

Example with Custom Clone

It could, however, be the case that you've set up a repository with one or more uses of the URLChecker that must clone one or more repos (possibly with varying branches) before doing the check. In this case, you might want to define git_path and branch for each section. An example is below:

name: Check URLs

on: [push]

jobs:
  build:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest

    steps:
    - name: URLs-checker
      uses: urlstechie/urlchecker-action@master
      with:
        # A project to clone. If not provided, assumes already cloned in the present working directory.
        git_path: https://github.com/urlstechie/URLs-checker-test-repo

        # If a git_path is defined to clone, clone this branch (defaults to master)
        branch: devel

        # A subfolder or path to navigate to in the present or cloned repository
        subfolder: docs

        # Delete the cloned repository after running URLchecked (default is false)
        cleanup: true

        # A comma-separated list of file types to cover in the URL checks
        file_types: .md,.py,.rst

        # Choose whether to include file with no URLs in the prints.
        print_all: false

        # Choose whether to print a more verbose end summary with files and broken URLs.
        verbose: true

        # The timeout seconds to provide to requests, defaults to 5 seconds
        timeout: 5

        # How many times to retry a failed request (each is logged, defaults to 1)
        retry_count: 3

        # A comma separated links to exclude during URL checks
        exclude_urls: https://github.com/SuperKogito/URLs-checker/issues/1,https://github.com/SuperKogito/URLs-checker/issues/2

        # A comma separated patterns to exclude during URL checks
        exclude_patterns: https://github.com/SuperKogito/Voice-based-gender-recognition/issues

        # A comma separated list of file patterns (direct paths work as well) to exclude
        exclude_files: README.md,/github/workspace/_config.yml

        # numbers of workers to run in parallel (defaults to 9 if unset)
        workers: 4

        # choose if the force pass or not
        force_pass: true

Inputs

variable name	variable type	variable description
git_path	optional	A git url to clone, if the repository isn't already in $PWD
branch	optional	If we do a clone, clone this branch (defaults to master
cleanup	optional	If we do a clone, delete the cloned folder after (false)
serial	optional	Run in serial (good for debugging)
subfolder	optional	A subfolder to navigate to in the repository to check
file_types	optional	A comma-separated list of file types to cover in the URLs checks.
include_files	optional	A comma-separated list of exact files to check.
print_all	optional	Choose whether to include file with no URLs in the prints.
verbose	optional	Choose whether to print a more verbose end summary with files and broken URLs
retry_count	optional	If a request fails, retry this number of times. Defaults to 1
save	optional	A path to a csv file to save results to
timeout	optional	The timeout to provide to requests to wait for a response.
exclude_urls	optional	A comma separated list of links.
exclude_patterns	optional	A comma separated list of patterns.
exclude_files	optional	Full paths to files to exclude (comma separated list).
force_pass	optional	Choose whether to force a pass when checks are done.
workers	optional	The number of checks (one per file) to run in parallel, defaults to 9

Details

Hidden File Types

If you need to specify a file_types pattern to include hidden files, you'll need a .* pattern that is provided in the context of a comma separated list, for example:

file_types: '.*,'

If there is another pattern or variable specification that you'd like to see an example of here, please open an issue.

Demo

• Using version > 0.1.4

• Using version =< 0.1.4

Support

Do you have a question or an issue? Please open an issue and we can help! The following communities are using the url checker! You can look here for examples or inspiration. If you want to add your community, please let us know with an issue.

Repository	Workflow (with permalink to YAML)	Example runs
awesome-rseng	Check URLs in PRs, exclude docs	Logs
buildtest	Check URLs in all commits	Logs
e4s	Check URLs in PR, exclude some URLs	Logs
us-rse	Check URLs in PRs, exclude some URL patterns	Logs
R-hub docs	Check URLs when on PR labelling	Logs
Berlin Hack & Tell	Check URLs when on PR labelling	Logs