Railway•13mo ago

How to get DATABASE_URL in Github Actions

When we create a PR, Railway automatic makes a new environment, says myproject-pr-40, inside we have Postgres service with new temporary DATABASE_URL variable, we want to have that value when running our Github Actions, is it possible?

name: Prisma Deploy

on:
  pull_request:
    paths:
      - packages/database/prisma/**
    types:
      - opened
      - synchronize

jobs:
  prisma-deploy:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest

    steps:
      - name: Checkout
        uses: actions/checkout@v3

      - name: Setup pnpm
        uses: pnpm/action-setup@v2

      - name: Setup Node
        uses: actions/setup-node@v3
        with:
          node-version: 18
          cache: "pnpm"

      - name: Install dependencies
        run: pnpm install

      - name: Deploy Migrations
        run: pnpm run migrate:deploy
        env:
          DATABASE_URL: ... <-- How to get Railway Postgres DATABASE_URL in `myproject-pr-40` environment here?

name: Prisma Deploy

on:
  pull_request:
    paths:
      - packages/database/prisma/**
    types:
      - opened
      - synchronize

jobs:
  prisma-deploy:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest

    steps:
      - name: Checkout
        uses: actions/checkout@v3

      - name: Setup pnpm
        uses: pnpm/action-setup@v2

      - name: Setup Node
        uses: actions/setup-node@v3
        with:
          node-version: 18
          cache: "pnpm"

      - name: Install dependencies
        run: pnpm install

      - name: Deploy Migrations
        run: pnpm run migrate:deploy
        env:
          DATABASE_URL: ... <-- How to get Railway Postgres DATABASE_URL in `myproject-pr-40` environment here?

Any hint is greatly appreciated. 🙏

30 Replies

Percy•13mo ago

Project ID: 28677a80-2aaf-46d7-8fff-e2898fa09eb1

Sang Dang•13mo ago

28677a80-2aaf-46d7-8fff-e2898fa09eb1

techmatic007•13mo ago

New>database >postgres

Sang Dang•13mo ago

@techmatic007 I don't understand what do you mean? I already have Postgres service running.

techmatic007•13mo ago

If you added postgres service on Railway project then add environment DATABASE_URL . It will automatically show postgres click on it.

Sang Dang•13mo ago

Thanks for quick response. The service already has the DATABASE_URL variable. I would like to get that value from inside our Github Actions.

techmatic007•13mo ago

oh I understand,idk @Brody will help you

techmatic007•13mo ago

BTW you can get url from postgres plugin variables.

Sang Dang•13mo ago

The struggle I'm facing is, we have Prisma, sometimes it has schema changes => migration need to be deployed. Our project monorepo structure:

./
/apps
    /dashboard
    /server
/packages
    /database <-- has prisma here
    /others

./
/apps
    /dashboard
    /server
/packages
    /database <-- has prisma here
    /others

For now, everything related to server works great. And we would like to have the prisma migrate deploy runs somewhere after the PR triggered. Thanks, but I do not want to manually copy/paste for every single PR I saw we have variables command in railway CLI, will play with it a bit

Brody•13mo ago

I very much do not appreciate being volunteered out like that, don't do that again please

Sang Dang•13mo ago

For now I use the CLI to get the value, but I face new issue, somehow it get wrong variable from production environment!

name: Prisma Preview

on:
  pull_request:
    branches:
      - master
    paths:
      - packages/database/prisma/**
    types:
      - opened
      - synchronize

env:
  PR_NUMBER: ${{ github.event.number }}
  RAILWAY_TOKEN: ${{ secrets.RAILWAY_TOKEN }}

jobs:
  prisma-preview:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest

    steps:
      - name: Checkout
        uses: actions/checkout@v3

      - name: Setup pnpm
        uses: pnpm/action-setup@v2

      - name: Setup Node
        uses: actions/setup-node@v3
        with:
          node-version: 18
          cache: "pnpm"

      - name: Install dependencies
        run: pnpm i --frozen-lockfile

      - name: Install Railway
        run: npm i -g @railway/cli

      - name: Activate Railway environment
        run: railway environment myproject-pr-$PR_NUMBER

      - name: Get Railway variables
        id: railway
        run: |
          DATABASE_URL=$(railway variables -s server --json | sed -n 's/.*"DATABASE_URL": "\(.*\)".*/\1/p')
          echo "DATABASE_URL=$DATABASE_URL" >> "$GITHUB_OUTPUT"

      - name: Deploy Migrations
        run: pnpm run migrate:deploy
        env:
          DATABASE_URL: ${{ steps.railway.outputs.DATABASE_URL }}

name: Prisma Preview

on:
  pull_request:
    branches:
      - master
    paths:
      - packages/database/prisma/**
    types:
      - opened
      - synchronize

env:
  PR_NUMBER: ${{ github.event.number }}
  RAILWAY_TOKEN: ${{ secrets.RAILWAY_TOKEN }}

jobs:
  prisma-preview:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest

    steps:
      - name: Checkout
        uses: actions/checkout@v3

      - name: Setup pnpm
        uses: pnpm/action-setup@v2

      - name: Setup Node
        uses: actions/setup-node@v3
        with:
          node-version: 18
          cache: "pnpm"

      - name: Install dependencies
        run: pnpm i --frozen-lockfile

      - name: Install Railway
        run: npm i -g @railway/cli

      - name: Activate Railway environment
        run: railway environment myproject-pr-$PR_NUMBER

      - name: Get Railway variables
        id: railway
        run: |
          DATABASE_URL=$(railway variables -s server --json | sed -n 's/.*"DATABASE_URL": "\(.*\)".*/\1/p')
          echo "DATABASE_URL=$DATABASE_URL" >> "$GITHUB_OUTPUT"

      - name: Deploy Migrations
        run: pnpm run migrate:deploy
        env:
          DATABASE_URL: ${{ steps.railway.outputs.DATABASE_URL }}

I checked the Github Actions output, it shows that the step Activate Railway environment run correctly. When I use the railway CLI locally, I can see the railway variables -s server return correct variable values for each environment. But in Github Actions, for some reason it always get production no matter what I try.

Brody•13mo ago

i have an incredably small amount of knowledge with gh actions, the best advice i could give would be to add some railway status commands here and there

Sang Dang•13mo ago

Thanks @Brody. I think this is because I use RAILWAY_TOKEN generated from production environment, making the railway variables -s server command ignores everything else. If this is the case then it's so hard for us to make Github Action to work with auto generated environment, as the token has to be generated manually.

Brody•13mo ago

that makes sense, can you use a global account token in this case?

Sang Dang•13mo ago

😍 oh do we have it? let me try

Brody•13mo ago

Sang Dang•13mo ago

😢 railway CLI uses only project token.

Sang Dang•13mo ago

Look like that global account token only used for GraphQL API at the moment sadcat

Brody•13mo ago

railway cli, at least on the desktop does use a global token, i guess just not that global token

Sang Dang•13mo ago

I can't find any place with another global token sadcat

Brody•13mo ago

best I could think of would be to pull it from the cli's config file on your desktop

Sang Dang•13mo ago

thanks @Brody for your patience, I got the user.token inside config.json but it failed with this error:

Login state is corrupt. Please logout and login back in.

Caused by:
    failed to parse header value

Login state is corrupt. Please logout and login back in.

Caused by:
    failed to parse header value

Brody•13mo ago

can you add a log to see what railway cli version github is installing?

Sang Dang•13mo ago

I ran npm info inside github action because the npm install does not show the version, I guess they get the same 🤷‍♂️

Brody•13mo ago

3.3.1 is the latest

Sang Dang•13mo ago

I have to use the API token and query then manually find the IDs, it works for now.

      - name: Install jq
        run: sudo apt-get install -y jq

      - name: Get Railway variables
        id: railway
        run: |
          ENVIRONMENTS=$(curl --request POST \
            --url https://backboard.railway.app/graphql/v2 \
            --header "Authorization: Bearer $RAILWAY_API_TOKEN" \
            --header "Content-Type: application/json" \
            --data '{ "query": "query { environments(projectId: \"'$PROJECT_ID'\") { edges { node { id name }}}}" }')
          ENVIRONMENT_ID=$(echo "$ENVIRONMENTS" | jq -r '.data.environments.edges[] | select(.node.name == "myproject-pr-'$PR_NUMBER'") | .node.id')
          VARIABLES=$(curl --request POST \
            --url https://backboard.railway.app/graphql/v2 \
            --header "Authorization: Bearer $RAILWAY_API_TOKEN" \
            --header "Content-Type: application/json" \
            --data '{ "query": "query {variables: variables(projectId: \"'$PROJECT_ID'\" environmentId: \"'$ENVIRONMENT_ID'\" pluginId: \"'$PLUGIN_ID'\")}" }')
          DATABASE_URL=$(echo "$VARIABLES" | jq -r '.data.variables.DATABASE_URL')
          echo "DATABASE_URL=$DATABASE_URL" >> "$GITHUB_OUTPUT"

      - name: Deploy Migrations
        run: pnpm run migrate:deploy
        env:
          DATABASE_URL: ${{ steps.railway.outputs.DATABASE_URL }}

      - name: Install jq
        run: sudo apt-get install -y jq

      - name: Get Railway variables
        id: railway
        run: |
          ENVIRONMENTS=$(curl --request POST \
            --url https://backboard.railway.app/graphql/v2 \
            --header "Authorization: Bearer $RAILWAY_API_TOKEN" \
            --header "Content-Type: application/json" \
            --data '{ "query": "query { environments(projectId: \"'$PROJECT_ID'\") { edges { node { id name }}}}" }')
          ENVIRONMENT_ID=$(echo "$ENVIRONMENTS" | jq -r '.data.environments.edges[] | select(.node.name == "myproject-pr-'$PR_NUMBER'") | .node.id')
          VARIABLES=$(curl --request POST \
            --url https://backboard.railway.app/graphql/v2 \
            --header "Authorization: Bearer $RAILWAY_API_TOKEN" \
            --header "Content-Type: application/json" \
            --data '{ "query": "query {variables: variables(projectId: \"'$PROJECT_ID'\" environmentId: \"'$ENVIRONMENT_ID'\" pluginId: \"'$PLUGIN_ID'\")}" }')
          DATABASE_URL=$(echo "$VARIABLES" | jq -r '.data.variables.DATABASE_URL')
          echo "DATABASE_URL=$DATABASE_URL" >> "$GITHUB_OUTPUT"

      - name: Deploy Migrations
        run: pnpm run migrate:deploy
        env:
          DATABASE_URL: ${{ steps.railway.outputs.DATABASE_URL }}

I hope Railway can allow us to use personal token (or API token) in CLI so it can query variables from all environments.

Brody•13mo ago

that would be ideal, but I love your persistence and problem solving abilities

Sang Dang•13mo ago

thanks 😄 I will mark this as solved for now, but would be happy to revisit when CLI has updated

nflxshaki•13mo ago

I copied my postgres url from railway and added it to my github secrets for the project. You can call the env variable inside of actions using ${{secrets.DATABASE_URL}} I had to upgrade to github pro plan to use environment variables as well

Sang Dang•13mo ago

Thanks Shaki, but for automatically generated environment, the DATABASE_URL is different from the one in production environment. And I don’t want to manually copy/paste for every single new PR.

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How to get DATABASE_URL in Github Actions