Automating migration with Actions Importer

You can use Actions Importer to plan and automatically migrate your CI/CD supported pipelines to Actions.

Actions Importer is distributed as a Docker container, and uses a CLI extension to interact with the container.

Any workflow that is converted by the Actions Importer should be inspected for correctness before using it as a production workload. The goal is to achieve an 80% conversion rate for every workflow, however, the actual conversion rate will depend on the makeup of each individual pipeline that is converted.

You can use Actions Importer to migrate from the following platforms:

Azure DevOps
Bamboo
Bitbucket Pipelines
CircleCI
GitLab (both cloud and self-hosted)
Jenkins
Travis CI

Actions Importer has the following requirements:

An environment where you can run Linux-based containers, and can install the necessary tools.
- Docker is installed and running.
- CLI is installed.
Note
The Actions Importer container and CLI do not need to be installed on the same server as your CI platform.

Install the Actions Importer CLI extension:

Bash

gh extension install /gh-actions-importer

gh extension install /gh-actions-importer

Verify that the extension is installed:

$ gh actions-importer -h
Options:
  -?, -h, --help  Show help and usage information

Commands:
  update     Update to the latest version of  Actions Importer.
  version    Display the version of  Actions Importer.
  configure  Start an interactive prompt to configure credentials used to authenticate with your CI server(s).
  audit      Plan your CI/CD migration by analyzing your current CI/CD footprint.
  forecast   Forecast  Actions usage from historical pipeline utilization.
  dry-run    Convert a pipeline to a  Actions workflow and output its yaml file.
  migrate    Convert a pipeline to a  Actions workflow and open a pull request with the changes.

To ensure you're running the latest version of Actions Importer, you should regularly run the update command:

gh actions-importer update

You must configure credentials that allow Actions Importer to communicate with and your current CI server. You can configure these credentials using environment variables or a .env.local file. The environment variables can be configured in an interactive prompt, by running the following command:

gh actions-importer configure

Use the subcommands of gh actions-importer to begin your migration to Actions, including audit, forecast, dry-run, and migrate.

The audit subcommand can be used to plan your CI/CD migration by analyzing your current CI/CD footprint. This analysis can be used to plan a timeline for migrating to Actions.

To run an audit, use the following command to determine your available options:

$ gh actions-importer audit -h
Description:
  Plan your CI/CD migration by analyzing your current CI/CD footprint.

[...]

Commands:
  azure-devops  An audit will output a list of data used in an Azure DevOps instance.
  bamboo        An audit will output a list of data used in a Bamboo instance.
  circle-ci     An audit will output a list of data used in a CircleCI instance.
  gitlab        An audit will output a list of data used in a GitLab instance.
  jenkins       An audit will output a list of data used in a Jenkins instance.
  travis-ci     An audit will output a list of data used in a Travis CI instance.

The forecast subcommand reviews historical pipeline usage to create a forecast of Actions usage.

To run a forecast, use the following command to determine your available options:

$ gh actions-importer forecast -h
Description:
  Forecasts  Actions usage from historical pipeline utilization.

[...]

Commands:
  azure-devops  Forecasts  Actions usage from historical Azure DevOps pipeline utilization.
  bamboo        Forecasts  Actions usage from historical Bamboo pipeline utilization.
  jenkins       Forecasts  Actions usage from historical Jenkins pipeline utilization.
  gitlab        Forecasts  Actions usage from historical GitLab pipeline utilization.
  circle-ci     Forecasts  Actions usage from historical CircleCI pipeline utilization.
  travis-ci     Forecasts  Actions usage from historical Travis CI pipeline utilization.
          Forecasts  Actions usage from historical  pipeline utilization.

The dry-run subcommand can be used to convert a pipeline to its Actions equivalent, and then write the workflow to your local filesystem.

To perform a dry run, use the following command to determine your available options:

$ gh actions-importer dry-run -h
Description:
  Convert a pipeline to a  Actions workflow and output its yaml file.

[...]

Commands:
  azure-devops  Convert an Azure DevOps pipeline to a  Actions workflow and output its yaml file.
  bamboo        Convert a Bamboo pipeline to  Actions workflows and output its yaml file.
  circle-ci     Convert a CircleCI pipeline to  Actions workflows and output the yaml file(s).
  gitlab        Convert a GitLab pipeline to a  Actions workflow and output the yaml file.
  jenkins       Convert a Jenkins job to a  Actions workflow and output its yaml file.
  travis-ci     Convert a Travis CI pipeline to a  Actions workflow and output its yaml file.

The migrate subcommand can be used to convert a pipeline to its Actions equivalent and then create a pull request with the contents.

To run a migration, use the following command to determine your available options:

$ gh actions-importer migrate -h
Description:
  Convert a pipeline to a  Actions workflow and open a pull request with the changes.

[...]

Commands:
  azure-devops  Convert an Azure DevOps pipeline to a  Actions workflow and open a pull request with the changes.
  bamboo        Convert a Bamboo pipeline to  Actions workflows and open a pull request with the changes.
  circle-ci     Convert a CircleCI pipeline to  Actions workflows and open a pull request with the changes.
  gitlab        Convert a GitLab pipeline to a  Actions workflow and open a pull request with the changes.
  jenkins       Convert a Jenkins job to a  Actions workflow and open a pull request with the changes.
  travis-ci     Convert a Travis CI pipeline to a  Actions workflow and open a pull request with the changes.

You can use Actions and Issues to run CLI commands for Actions Importer. This allows you to migrate your CI/CD workflows without installing software on your local machine. This approach is especially useful for organizations that want to enable self-service migrations to Actions. Once IssueOps is configured, users can open an issue with the relevant template to migrate pipelines to Actions.

For more information about setting up self-serve migrations with IssueOps, see the actions/importer-issue-ops template repository.

The Actions Importer labs repository contains platform-specific learning paths that teach you how to use Actions Importer and how to approach migrations to Actions. You can use this repository to learn how to use Actions Importer to help plan, forecast, and automate your migration to Actions.

To learn more, see the Actions Importer labs repository.

Portions have been adapted from https://.com//gh-actions-importer/ under the MIT license:

MIT License

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Automating migration with Actions Importer

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