Improving Swift Package Scripts with GitHub Actions workflows

I have improved my open-source project Swift Package Scripts which contains Swift Package-related scripts, by adding a couple of convenient GitHub Action Workflows to it.

What is Swift Package Scripts?

Swift Package Scripts is an open-source project that has plain Terminal scripts for handling common Swift Package-related tasks, like building, testing, releasing, bumping version, etc.

Unlike other tools, Swift Package Scripts doesn’t require any additional system tools, like Ruby. This makes easier and more lightweight to use compared to other tools.

How do you add it to your package?

All you have to do to add Swift Package Scripts to your package is to clone or download the source code, then run the sync_to.sh script from the root folder, with a path to your Swift package.

./sync_to.sh ../../Projects/MyPackage/

This will copy the scripts/ folder to your project folder and replace any already existing folder that you may already have there.

How do you use the scripts?

Once you have the scripts/ folder in your project folder, you can call the scripts from the Terminal.

For instance, you can get the package name with ./script/package_name.sh, build the package for all supported platforms with ./scripts/build.sh and test it on iOS with ./scripts/test.sh -p iOS.

These scripts perform individual as well as composite tasks. For instance, the release.sh script uses several other scripts to create a new release.

Available scripts

At the time of writing Swift Package Scripts has the following scripts:

• build.sh - Build a target for all or certain platforms.
• chmod.sh - Run chmod +x on all scripts in the same folder.
• docc.sh - Build DocC documentation for all or certain platforms, incl. web transformed docs.
• git_default_branch.sh - Get the default git branch name.
• package_name.sh - Get the package name.
• release.sh - Validate the current branch and code, then create a new release tag.
• sync_from.sh - Sync scripts from a Swift Package Scripts folder.
• test.sh - Test a target on all or certain platforms.
• validate_release.sh - Perform pre-release validations and tests.
• validate_release_branch.sh - Validate that a release is made from the main branch.
• version_bump.sh - Bump the current version a major, minor, or patch step.
• version_number.sh - Get the current version number.
• xcframework.sh - Generate a binary XCFramework for all or certain platforms.

NEW - GitHub Actions Workflows!

The latest major version of Swift Package Scripts adds a set of handy GitHub Actions workflows to a new .github folder in the project root.

• build.yml - Build the package for all or certain platforms.
• docc.yml - Build DocC and deploy documentation to GitHub Pages.
• test.yml - Test the package on all or certain platforms.
• version_bump.yml - Bump the current version a major, minor, or patch step.
• xcframework.yml - Generate a binary XCFramework and dSYMs for all or certain platforms.

The build, docc and test workflows will run on each push to the main branch, while version_bump and xcframework has to be triggered manually.

Unlike scripts, you may not want to add the entire .github folder to your project. Instead, just copy the workflows that make sense for your project. Although the workflows use the scripts to resolve contextual information, you may want to adjust which platforms to target.

The .github folder also contains a FUNDING.yml file that shows you how to set up GitHub Sponsors.

Conclusion

SwiftPackageScripts has been extended with GitHub Actions workflows that can be used to ensure that your code builds and that all tests pass. There are also workflows that simplify automatically updating the online documentation on each push, bumping the package version, and generating binary artifacts.

If you manage a Swift Package, make sure to give SwiftPackageScripts a try and let me know what you think.