How we can construct string like 2022-12-03-refs-heads-feature-branch-1-1234abc in GitHub Actions?

We can use several predefined environment variables in the GitHub Actions environment. They are described in the documentation: Environment variables - GitHub Docs.

This string 2022-12-03-refs-heads-feature-branch-1-1234abc can be divided into three parts: today’s date, the reference name (like refs-heads-feature-branch-1), and git commit hash (1234abc).

The date can be created from date command. The reference name can be created from GITHUB_REF (like refs/heads/feature-branch-1). The commit hash can be created from GITHUB_SHA (like ffac537e6cbbf934b08745a378932722df287a53).

The date should be OK, but other environment variables contains illegal characters for the filename or just too long. The normal run: command seems to be run on bash in the standard environment (Ubuntu VM?) so we can use a bash’s feature called Shell Parameter Expansion (Bash Reference Manual).

To make the desired string 2022-12-03-refs-heads-feature-branch-1-1234abc, we can use the expression like this: $(date +%Y-%m-%d)-${GITHUB_REF////-}-${GITHUB_SHA::7}. The ${VARIABLE//A/B} means to replace A with B in VARIABLE and the ${VARIABLE:0:7} means to substring VARIABLE from position 0 (which can be omitted) to position 7.

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