Support semantic version ranges (e.g., ^2.0) for ref input #2290
Description
Currently, the ref input in actions/checkout only accepts an exact branch, tag, or commit SHA. It would be very helpful if ref could support semantic version ranges, similar to Composer or npm.
For example, suppose a repository has release tags:
1.0.0, 1.0.1, 2.0.0, 2.2.0, 3.0.0
If I pass:
with:
ref: ^2.0
actions/checkout should automatically pick up the latest compatible tag, in this case 2.2.0.
This feature would simplify workflows that need to checkout the latest minor/patch release in a major version without manually updating the tag every time a new release is published.
Benefits:
- Avoids hardcoding exact tags in workflows.
- Makes CI/CD pipelines more robust to minor/patch releases.
- Brings parity with common package managers that support semver ranges.