AllSpice Actions vs GitHub Actions

Comparison with GitHub Actions

Allspice Actions aims to be compatible with GitHub Actions, but there are some key differences between the two.

Additional Features

Absolute Action URLs

AllSpice Actions allows defining actions via absolute URLs, enabling the use of actions from any Git repository. For example:

• uses: https://github.com/actions/checkout

• uses: http://hub.allspice.io/owner/repo@branch

Non-standard Schedule Syntax

AllSpice Actions supports non-standard schedule syntax like @yearly, @monthly, @weekly, @daily, and @hourly, which GitHub Actions does not support. More details can be found here.

Unsupported Workflow Syntax

Concurrency

AllSpice Actions currently ignores the concurrency keyword, which is used to run a single job at a time. More details can be found in the GitHub Actions documentation on Using concurrency.

Run Name

The run-name keyword, used for naming workflow runs, is ignored by AllSpice Actions. See more in the GitHub Actions documentation.

Permissions

AllSpice Actions ignores the permissions and jobs.<job_id>.permissions keywords. Refer to the GitHub Actions documentation.

Timeout Minutes

The jobs.<job_id>.timeout-minutes keyword is also ignored by AllSpice Actions. More information is available here.

Continue on Error

The jobs.<job_id>.continue-on-error keyword is not supported by AllSpice Actions. Details can be found here.

Environment

AllSpice Actions ignores the jobs.<job_id>.environment keyword. See more in the GitHub Actions documentation.

Complex runs-on Syntax

AllSpice Actions only supports simple runs-on syntax like runs-on: xyz or runs-on: [xyz]. Complex syntax is not supported. More details here.

workflow_dispatch

The workflow_dispatch event is ignored by AllSpice Actions. See more in the GitHub Actions documentation.

hashFiles Expression

AllSpice Actions does not support the hashFiles expression, which results in an empty string if used. As a workaround, consider using go-hashfiles. More information on expressions can be found here.

Missing Features

Problem Matchers

Problem Matchers, which scan action outputs for regex patterns and highlight information in the UI, are not supported by AllSpice Actions. More details here.

Error Annotations

Creating error annotations is not supported by AllSpice Actions. See more in the GitHub Actions documentation.

Expressions

AllSpice Actions supports only the always() expression

Context Availability

Context availability is not checked in AllSpice Actions, allowing the env context to be used in more places. See more in the GitHub Actions documentation.