Decrease build times

[limjh16]

Makes use of https://github.com/actions/cache and removes some dependencies from the Dockerfile to decrease GitHub Actions build times. From my own testing, the runtime for the workflow has decreased to ~40sec from ~2min20sec previously.

[limjh16]

Hey, I just recently found this jekyll docker image (https://hub.docker.com/r/jekyll/jekyll/), can I ask if there is any reason why you didn't use this instead of the ruby one? I personally have not tested it yet but it looks like it can get the job done EDIT: nevermind, that image seems outdated, and other jekyll images are not really suitable they mess up the cache and don't really decrease the dockerfile build time anyways.

[helaili]

Thanks @limjh16

The main reason I'm adding more packages (i.e. build-essential) is so I can run the jekyll-asciidoc gem out-of-the-box, and most likely some other jekyll plugins.

[helaili]

... oh, and I do like the cache optimization!

[limjh16]

if I'm not wrong, the Ruby docker base image already contains gcc and make and a few other tools. that should be enough to run the plugin? I will try it tomorrow to confirm. also, sorry 😅 I accidentally pressed the close PR button on my phone...

[limjh16]

Okay I fixed the error when building extensions, when I was testing it previously it worked but it was using the cache and not really building the extension that's why it was working

However to fix it I used the ruby base image instead of the slim one which increased the Docker build time by ~10sec, seems like this image is really huge (though it is still faster than the slim one +build-essentials)

I'm looking into using other base images or maybe creating a smaller one and uploading it to docker hub, though there are a lot of jekyll images images there already so I'm not sure if this is a good idea. I did a few experiments yesterday with the ruby alpine image, seems like the decreased image size may help here.

[limjh16]

Seems like it worked, asciidoc and the previously failed eventmachine can both be built. Changing to alpine image also decreases the total build time to ~30sec, so that seems good. Successful workflow run can be seen here https://github.com/limjh16/jekyll-action/runs/603871282

EDIT: To skip past the docker image initialisation part and directly use the virtual environment inside actions, I made another action https://github.com/limjh16/jekyll-action/pull/3 but I'm not sure how to turn it into a action.yml file that others can use rather than just a workflow file, any ideas would be appreciated! Testing without the docker image yields total build times of ~15sec! That's faster than any CI I tried to build jekyll with.

EDIT 2: Seems like using the virtual environment that GitHub provides directly also allows for installing a specific Bundler version (https://github.com/ruby/setup-ruby/#bundler), which may help to fix issue #16

[limjh16]

Just a suggestion: Maybe you can include a link to jekyll's docs in the README (it is currently in PR stage, not merged to their main website yet https://github.com/jekyll/jekyll/pull/8119) It explains how to use this action, and may be useful for beginners as they explain it step by step. And maybe they should include the caching step of this action?

[helaili]

To skip past the docker image initialisation part and directly use the virtual environment inside actions, I made another action limjh16#3 but I'm not sure how to turn it into a action.yml file that others can use rather than just a workflow file,

I've thought already about getting rid of the Docker part but like you said the packaging is problematic. It's a trade-of between performance and simplicity I guess.

[limjh16]

Hey! sorry for all the spam, https://github.com/helaili/jekyll-action/pull/17/commits/af3293c2d6f25c063e2a3448433fe47d4d65b11c should have fixed https://github.com/helaili/jekyll-action/pull/17#discussion_r413017026 so the review issues seems resolved. However, with regards to the getting rid of docker, I made a separate branch testing a javascript action rather than a Docker action and it looks good, with runs taking ~15sec since we can skip the docker initialisation, and all as a action rather than a workflow file. Not sure whether you'd like me to PR that, since I haven't tested it with any repo other than my own so I cannot confirm whether it works for more use cases. EDIT: I have tested that javascript action with an older bundler version to fix #16 , https://github.com/limjh16/jekyll-action/commit/f7704f66eedb95e235786bd37b85038d19229170 it seems to work well.

[helaili]

Thanks a lot for all this ✨

Regarding the JS version, why don't you publish it under your account and I'll link to it in the readme as a better alternative? You deserve all the credit for it so it's only fair.

[limjh16]

Regarding the JS version, why don't you publish it under your account and I'll link to it in the readme as a better alternative? You deserve all the credit for it so it's only fair.

Hey, thanks for the offer! I recently finished it and tested it on my own repo, it'll be great if you could link it, it's here: limjh16/jekyll-action-ts It's more complicated to set up but it also allows for custom ruby and bundler versions since I am using the ruby/setup-ruby action which allows for more flexibility

[helaili]

I've updated the README and mentioned your version @limjh16. Thanks again!