How to reset github run_number in github actions?

Question

I tried in my workflow yaml file:

env:
  RELEASE_VERSION: 1
  RELEASE_SUBVERSION1: 0
  RELEASE_SUBVERSION2: ${{ 31 -  github.run_number }} # 31 is the current github.run_number + 1

But it doesn't seem that github allows such expressions.

How can I reset this counter?

Answer 1

There is no "native" way of resetting the github.build_number. However, you can use the following GitHub action.

Here is how I did it:

jobs:
  reset-run-number:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    name: reset github.run_number
    outputs:
      run-number: ${{ steps.get-build.outputs.build-number }}
    steps:
    - name: Get build number
      id: get-build
      uses: mlilback/build-number@v1
      with:
        # The current run_number is 143, and I want it to be 0
        base: -143
        run-id: ${{ github.run_number }}
    
    # print the number in a different step
    - name: Print build number
      run: echo "Number: ${{ steps.get-build.outputs.build-number }}"
      # output: "Number: 0"

  use-run-number:
    needs: reset-run-number
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    name: print new number from another job
    steps:
    # print the number in a different job
    - name: Print build number
      run: echo "Number: ${{ needs.reset-run-number.outputs.run-number }}"
      # output: "Number: 0"