Preserve tag annotations

The technique this tool uses for checking out tags only preserves the relation between tag and ref, not any annotations created with git tag -a.

git fetch origin +$HASH:refs/tags/$TAG
git checkout -f refs/tag/$TAG

I have a CI action that depends on information from annotated tags. Specifically, the name of the person who applied the tag: git tag --list --points-at HEAD --format '%(taggeremail)' (I can’t use ${{ github.actor }} for reasons).

The workaround is to run git fetch -f origin ${{ github.ref }}:${{ github.ref }}. But it would be better not to need this workaround.

[morrone]

Agreed! This breaks the “git describe” command too. We need tags to be in their correct original form.

[Envek]

+1 on preserving tag annotations. fetch-depth: 0 alone doesn’t help, git fetch --tags --force does help.

name: Create release from annotated tag
on: push
jobs:
  release:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v2
        with:
          fetch-depth: 0 # Doesn't help
      - name: "Extract data from tag: version, message, body"
        id: tag
        run: |
          git fetch --tags --force # Retrieve annotated tags. THIS TRICK REALLY HELPS
          echo ::set-output name=subject::$(git for-each-ref $GITHUB_REF --format='%(contents:subject)')
          # …
      - name: Create Release
        uses: actions/create-release@v1
        env:
          GITHUB_TOKEN: ${{ secrets.GITHUB_TOKEN }}
        with:
          tag_name: ${{ github.ref }}
          release_name: ${{ steps.tag.outputs.subject }}