terraform-docs GitHub Actions

Generate Terraform module documentation in pull requests.

In addition to statically defined directory modules, this module can search specific subfolders or parse atlantis.yaml for module identification and doc generation. This action has the ability to auto commit docs to an open PR or after a push to a specific branch.

Version

v1.4.1 (uses terraform-docs v0.20.0, which is supported and tested on Terraform version 0.11+ and 0.12+ but may work for others.)

Upgrade v0 to v1

Release v1 contains following breaking changes:

• default value of output-file has been changed to README.md

• default value of template has been changed to

  <!-- BEGIN_TF_DOCS -->
  {{ .Content }}
  <!-- END_TF_DOCS -->
  

Usage

To use terraform-docs github action, configure a YAML workflow file, e.g. .github/workflows/documentation.yml, with the following:

name: Generate terraform docs
on:
  - pull_request
jobs:
  docs:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
    - uses: actions/checkout@v3
      with:
        ref: ${{ github.event.pull_request.head.ref }}

    - name: Render terraform docs inside the README.md and push changes back to PR branch
      uses: terraform-docs/gh-actions@v1.4.1
      with:
        working-dir: .
        output-file: README.md
        output-method: inject
        git-push: "true"

NOTE: If output-file (default README.md) already exists it will need to be updated, with the block delimeters <!-- BEGIN_TF_DOCS --> and <!-- END_TF_DOCS -->, where the generated markdown will be injected. Otherwise the generated content will be appended at the end of the file.

NOTE: If output-file (default README.md) doesn't exist it will created and the content will be saved into it.

Configuration

Inputs

Name	Description	Default	Required
args	Additional arguments to pass to the command (see full documentation)	""	false
atlantis-file	Name of Atlantis file to extract list of directories by parsing it. To enable, provide the file name (e.g. atlantis.yaml)	disabled	false
config-file	Name of terraform-docs config file. To enable, provide the file name (e.g. .terraform-docs.yml)	disabled	false
fail-on-diff	Fail the job if there is any diff found between the generated output and existing file (ignored if git-push is set)	false	false
find-dir	Name of root directory to extract list of directories by running find ./find\_dir -name \*.tf (ignored if atlantis-file is set)	disabled	false
git-commit-message	Commit message	terraform-docs: automated action	false
git-push	If true it will commit and push the changes	false	false
git-push-sign-off	If true it will sign-off commit	false	false
git-push-user-email	If empty the no-reply email of the GitHub Actions bot will be used (i.e. github-actions[bot]@users.noreply.github.com)	""	false
git-push-user-name	If empty the name of the GitHub Actions bot will be used (i.e. github-actions[bot])	""	false
git-sub-dir	Subdirectory that terraform code is checked out into	""	false
indention	Indention level of Markdown sections [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]	2	false
output-file	File in module directory where the docs should be placed	README.md	false
output-format	terraform-docs format to generate content (see all formats) (ignored if config-file is set)	markdown table	false
output-method	Method should be one of replace, inject, or print. Set as an empty string if output.mode and output.file are defined in config-file	inject	false
recursive	If true it will update submodules recursively	false	false
recursive-path	Submodules path to recursively update	modules	false
template	When provided will be used as the template if/when the output-file does not exist. Set as an empty string if output.template is defined in config-file	<!-- BEGIN_TF_DOCS -->\n{{ .Content }}\n<!-- END_TF_DOCS -->	false
working-dir	Comma separated list of directories to generate docs for (ignored if atlantis-file or find-dir is set)	.	false

Output Method (output-method)

• print

  This will just print the generated output

• replace

  This will create or replace the output-file at the determined module path(s)

• inject

  Instead of replacing the output-file, this will inject the generated documentation into the existing file between the predefined delimeters: <!-- BEGIN_TF_DOCS --> and <!-- END_TF_DOCS -->. If the file exists but does not contain the delimeters, the action will append the generated content at the end of output-file. If the file doesn't exist, it will create it using the value template which MUST have the delimeters.

Auto commit changes

To enable you need to ensure a few things first:

• set git-push to true
• use actions/checkout@v3 with the head ref for PRs or branch name for pushes

  • PR

    on:
      - pull_request
    jobs:
      docs:
        runs-on: ubuntu-latest
        steps:
        - uses: actions/checkout@v3
          with:
            ref: ${{ github.event.pull_request.head.ref }}

  • Push

    on:
      push:
        branches:
          - master
    jobs:
      docs:
        runs-on: ubuntu-latest
        steps:
        - uses: actions/checkout@v3
          with:
            ref: master

Outputs

Name	Description
num_changed	Number of files changed

Examples

Single folder

- name: Generate TF Docs
  uses: terraform-docs/gh-actions@v1.4.1
  with:
    working-dir: .

Multi folder

- name: Generate TF Docs
  uses: terraform-docs/gh-actions@v1.4.1
  with:
    working-dir: .,example1,example3/modules/test

Use atlantis.yaml v3 to find all directories

- name: Generate TF docs
  uses: terraform-docs/gh-actions@v1.4.1
  with:
    atlantis-file: atlantis.yaml

Find all .tf file under a given directory

- name: Generate TF docs
  uses: terraform-docs/gh-actions@v1.4.1
  with:
    find-dir: examples/

Recursively under a given directory

- name: Generate TF docs
  uses: terraform-docs/gh-actions@v1.4.1
  with:
    working-dir: examples/
    recursive: true
    recursive-path: modules

Complete examples can be found here.