Migrating from CircleCI to GitHub Actions involves moving your CI/CD workflow definitions and making sure all the secrets, environment variables, and specific configurations are set up correctly in the new environment. Here’s a step-by-step guide to help you migrate:
1. Review Your Current Configuration:
- Before starting, understand the CircleCI configuration by checking the
.circleci/config.ymlin your project. - Make a note of all the steps, environment variables, jobs, workflows, and any custom logic/scripts that are involved.
2. Set Up Your GitHub Repository:
- If your repository isn’t already on GitHub, push it there.
- Ensure you have appropriate permissions to set up Actions and Secrets for the repository.
3. Define the GitHub Actions Workflow:
- Create a directory
.github/workflowsin your repository if it doesn’t exist.
Now, for each job/workflow you have in CircleCI, create a new .yml file inside this directory.
4. Translating CircleCI Configuration to GitHub Actions:
- Workflow & Jobs:
- Translate your CircleCI workflows and jobs into GitHub Actions jobs.
- Unlike CircleCI, GitHub Actions doesn’t differentiate between workflows and jobs in the same strict manner. Essentially, every .yml file can be a workflow on its own.
- Steps:
- Translate CircleCI steps into GitHub Actions steps.
- There’s a rich marketplace of actions provided by GitHub and the community. For example, to checkout code, you can use: actions/checkout@v2.
- Docker:
- If you’re using a Docker executor in CircleCI, you can use a container job in GitHub Actions.
- Caching:
- Translate caching in CircleCI to actions/cache in GitHub Actions.
5. Environment Variables & Secrets:
In CircleCI, you might have used context or project settings for secrets and environment variables.
In GitHub Actions, move these to ‘Secrets’. You can set them under Your Repo > Settings > Secrets.
In the workflow file, use $ to access the secret.
6. Integrate with AWS and Terraform:
If you’re using AWS CLI or SDK in your workflow, configure AWS credentials using aws-actions/configure-aws-credentials@v1.
For Terraform, you might want to look into the hashicorp/setup-terraform action.
Ensure all environment-specific variables for Terraform are properly configured.
7. Testing the Workflow:
- Once you’ve translated the configuration, push a commit or use a pull request to trigger the GitHub Actions workflows. Monitor the execution and fix any issues or errors that arise.
- Iteratively improve the workflow until it matches the reliability and functionality of your CircleCI configuration.
8. Optimizations and Advanced Features:
Explore matrix builds if you had parallel workflows in CircleCI.
Implement build artifacts, test reports, etc. as needed.
9. Update Documentation & Notify Team:
Since CI/CD can be critical for team workflows, ensure all team members are informed about the migration and any changes they need to be aware of.
Update any project documentation or guidelines to reflect the move to GitHub Actions.
10. Monitoring & Notifications:
Ensure you have proper notifications set up, so team members are alerted of build failures or other critical issues.
Monitor the workflows for a while to ensure they’re running as expected.
