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actions

crabbox actions prepares a leased box from your repository's own GitHub Actions workflow, so repo-owned setup (toolchains, dependencies, caches, services) runs the same way CI does before crabbox run attaches.

Hydration has two modes:

  • Local hydration (default) runs the hydrate workflow over SSH on the leased box. Crabbox reads the workflow file from .github/workflows/, syncs the current checkout, executes supported setup steps in the persistent workspace, and waits for the ready marker. This path needs no GitHub repository write access.
  • GitHub runner hydration (--github-runner) registers the box as a self-hosted runner, dispatches the configured workflow with the canonical lease label, and waits for the workflow to write the marker. Use it when the workflow needs full GitHub Actions semantics — repository secrets, OIDC, service containers, or unsupported actions.

The companion commands actions register and actions dispatch expose the runner-registration and workflow-dispatch steps directly.

Subcommands

hydrate  --id <lease-id-or-slug> [--provider <provider>] [--target linux|macos|windows]
         [--windows-mode normal|wsl2] [--repo owner/name] [--workflow <file|name|id>]
         [--job <name>] [--ref <ref>] [--github-runner] [--wait-timeout 20m]
         [--keep-alive-minutes 90] [--reclaim] [--timing-json] [-f key=value] [--field key=value]

register --id <lease-id-or-slug> [--provider <provider>] [--target linux|macos|windows]
         [--windows-mode normal|wsl2] [--repo owner/name] [--name <runner-name>]
         [--labels <csv>] [--version latest] [--ephemeral=true] [--reclaim]

dispatch [--repo owner/name] [--workflow <file|name|id>] [--ref <ref>] [-f key=value] [--field key=value]

hydrate and register validate the current repo's lease claim before touching the box. Pass --reclaim to intentionally move a lease to the current repo. When local defaults point at another backend, repeat the same provider/target routing flags used to create the lease.

hydrate

Populates a lease's workspace from the configured workflow. Requires --id and either --workflow or actions.workflow.

crabbox warmup
crabbox actions hydrate --id blue-lobster
crabbox run --id blue-lobster -- pnpm test:changed

Local hydration supports Linux and Windows WSL2 targets. With --github-runner, native Windows is also supported. Static macOS hosts can run commands through provider=ssh, but Actions hydration still requires Linux, Windows WSL2, or native Windows with --github-runner.

Blacksmith Testbox IDs (tbx_...) and --provider blacksmith-testbox are skipped, because Blacksmith owns Testbox hydration. Run commands against those boxes directly with crabbox run --provider blacksmith-testbox --id <tbx_id> -- ....

On success, hydrate prints a workspace summary and a total-duration line. Add --timing-json to emit a final JSON timing record (stderr) with provider, lease ID, slug, total duration, exit code, and — for the GitHub fallback — the Actions run URL when the marker reports a run ID.

register

Registers an existing box as a GitHub Actions self-hosted runner. Crabbox obtains a repository registration token through gh api, installs the official actions/runner package, and starts it under systemd on Linux/WSL2 or a detached PowerShell process on native Windows. Supports Linux and Windows targets only. Registration metadata and the short-lived token travel over SSH stdin rather than the remote process command line.

crabbox actions register --id blue-lobster

Each runner gets the labels crabbox, the canonical lease label crabbox-<lease-id>, profile/class labels, the slug label when available, and any labels from actions.runnerLabels or --labels. Runner names use the friendly slug when available; workflow inputs and state-file paths keep using the canonical cbx_... ID.

dispatch

Dispatches the configured workflow via gh workflow run. Requires --workflow or actions.workflow.

crabbox actions dispatch -f testbox_id=cbx_abcdef123456

Workflow inputs

Every -f / --field value must be key=value. During actions hydrate, CLI values override matching actions.fields entries. Automatic hydration also uses actions.fields.

Standalone actions dispatch sends only inputs explicitly supplied with -f / --field; it still uses configured repository, workflow, and ref defaults.

For GitHub runner hydration, Crabbox inspects the selected workflow's workflow_dispatch.inputs (when the workflow path is available under .github/workflows/). It sends only declared inputs and requires crabbox_id, crabbox_runner_label, and crabbox_keep_alive_minutes; crabbox_job is optional. If that hydration dispatch rejects crabbox_job as an unexpected input, Crabbox retries once without it so older workflow refs stay usable.

A hydrate workflow must accept these inputs:

on:
  workflow_dispatch:
    inputs:
      crabbox_id:
        required: true
        type: string
      crabbox_runner_label:
        required: true
        type: string
      crabbox_job:
        required: false
        default: "hydrate"
        type: string
      crabbox_keep_alive_minutes:
        required: false
        default: "90"
        type: string

For local hydration, Crabbox runs the YAML job named hydrate when present, or the only job in a single-job workflow. actions.job is the marker-input value, not the YAML job selector; older workflows can omit both. When actions.job is set and the workflow declares crabbox_job, Crabbox sends it and verifies the ready marker came from that job. For --github-runner, the job should target the dynamic lease label:

runs-on: [self-hosted, "${{ inputs.crabbox_runner_label }}"]

Config

actions:
  repo: example-org/my-app
  workflow: .github/workflows/crabbox.yml
  job: hydrate
  ref: main
  fields:
    - crabbox_docker_cache=true
  runnerLabels:
    - crabbox
  runnerVersion: latest
  ephemeral: true

Use actions.fields for repository-specific workflow inputs that should be sent on every hydration.

Hydration flow

Use hydration when CI already knows how to prepare the repository and you want a fast local-style loop:

crabbox warmup
crabbox actions hydrate --id blue-lobster
crabbox run --id blue-lobster -- pnpm test:changed

The workflow owns repository-specific setup: checkout, dependency install, caches, and project tools. Local hydration supports run steps plus common setup actions: actions/checkout, actions/setup-node, pnpm/action-setup, actions/setup-go, actions/setup-python, and actions/cache/restore|save (cache restore reports a miss; save is skipped). pnpm/action-setup requires an explicit exact version (major.minor.patch) and installs into the managed tool cache without lifecycle scripts; it bootstraps Node 24 if Node or npm is absent, so pnpm setup may precede setup-node. A later setup-node selects the project Node version without displacing the managed pnpm. Other pnpm inputs and version inference/ranges require --github-runner; install project dependencies in a separate run step. Setup-node accepts cache: pnpm as an explicitly uncached local run. Repo-local composite actions (./path) are supported. Job containers and service containers are not; actions/checkout options that change the repository, path, submodules, or LFS fail locally so you can rerun with --github-runner when you need full GitHub Actions semantics.

Local hydration resolves simple expressions in env, run steps, working directories, and supported action inputs: ${{ inputs.name }}, ${{ env.NAME }}, ${{ github.workspace }}, ${{ hashFiles(...) }}, and runner temp/toolcache references. Unsupported or complex expressions fail with a suggestion to use --github-runner.

After checkout and setup, the workflow writes the ready marker under $HOME/.crabbox/actions/. Map workflow inputs into step environment variables such as CRABBOX_ID and CRABBOX_JOB; do not interpolate them directly into shell source:

case "$CRABBOX_ID" in
  ""|*[!A-Za-z0-9_-]*)
    echo "::error::crabbox_id must match [A-Za-z0-9_-]+"
    exit 2
    ;;
esac
case "$CRABBOX_JOB" in
  *$'\n'*|*$'\r'*)
    echo "::error::crabbox_job must not contain line breaks"
    exit 2
    ;;
esac
job="$CRABBOX_JOB"
[ -n "$job" ] || job=hydrate
mkdir -p "$HOME/.crabbox/actions"
state="$HOME/.crabbox/actions/${CRABBOX_ID}.env"
env_file="$HOME/.crabbox/actions/${CRABBOX_ID}.env.sh"
services_file="$HOME/.crabbox/actions/${CRABBOX_ID}.services"
{
  echo "WORKSPACE=${GITHUB_WORKSPACE}"
  echo "RUN_ID=${GITHUB_RUN_ID}"
  echo "JOB=${job}"
  echo "ENV_FILE=${env_file}"
  echo "SERVICES_FILE=${services_file}"
  echo "READY_AT=$(date -u +%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%SZ)"
} > "${state}.tmp"
mv "${state}.tmp" "$state"

crabbox run --id <lease-id-or-slug> reads that marker, syncs into the hydrated $GITHUB_WORKSPACE, and sources the non-secret env file when present. If no marker exists and actions.workflow is configured, run performs local hydration automatically after sync unless --no-hydrate or --no-sync is set. The env file should hold stable GitHub/runner context such as GITHUB_WORKSPACE, GITHUB_RUN_ID, GITHUB_JOB, RUNNER_TEMP, and RUNNER_TOOL_CACHE — never secrets or OIDC request tokens. Keep the workflow job alive (via --keep-alive-minutes) only when using --github-runner and service containers or job-scoped setup must stay running for the remote command loop. crabbox stop <lease-id-or-slug> writes the .stop marker before releasing the box.

Warm with a runner

crabbox warmup --actions-runner leases a box and registers it as an ephemeral runner in one step:

crabbox warmup --actions-runner
crabbox warmup --provider aws --target windows --windows-mode wsl2
crabbox actions hydrate --provider aws --target windows --windows-mode wsl2 --id blue-lobster
crabbox run --id blue-lobster -- pnpm test

See also

  • run — sync and run commands against a lease.
  • warmup — lease and ready a box.
  • capsule — capture and replay failures from Actions runs.