How to test GitHub Actions

Unleash the power of targeted testing 🎯 and streamlined development with branch-specific workflows in GitHub Actions! This guide takes you step-by-step 🚶‍♂️ through the process of setting up your own custom workflow, ensuring your tests only run on relevant branches and keeping your workflow clean and efficient. ✨

Committing a test.yml to your main branch can trigger other actions on the push event!

1. Create new branch

Create a new branch called action-test from your main branch

git checkout -b action-test-branch

2. Add new yml file

touch .github/workflows/test.yml

3. Add your trigger

Edit the trigger in yml file to work on push event on action-test-branch

name: "My Test Workflow"

on:
  workflow_dispatch:
  push:
    branches:
      - action-test-branch

jobs:
  my-job:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - name: my-step
        run: echo "Hello World!"

4. Commit and push

git add ".github/workflows/test.yml"
git commit -m "Added test workflow!"

5. Done

GitHub.com > Actions will show only the test.yml workflow is running without affecting other actions on main branch