Gautam Krishna R

Posted on Jul 21, 2020 • Updated on Mar 25, 2023

Show your latest dev.to posts automatically on your GitHub profile readme

#github #showdev #productivity #javascript

I just created a GitHub Action that lets you add links to your latest blog posts from Dev.to and other sources to your Github Profile readme automatically.

Check it out if you want a readme like this:

Project on GitHub: https://github.com/gautamkrishnar/blog-post-workflow
Example readme: https://github.com/gautamkrishnar

Demo video

How to use

Star this repo 😉
Go to your repository
Add the following section to your README.md file, you can give whatever title you want. Just make sure that you use  in your readme. The workflow will replace this comment with the actual blog post list:

# Blog posts
<!-- BLOG-POST-LIST:START -->
<!-- BLOG-POST-LIST:END -->

Create a folder named .github and create a workflows folder inside it if it doesn't exist.
Create a new file named blog-post-workflow.yml with the following contents inside the workflows folder:

name: Latest blog post workflow
on:
  schedule: # Run workflow automatically
    - cron: '0 * * * *' # Runs every hour, on the hour
  workflow_dispatch: # Run workflow manually (without waiting for the cron to be called), through the Github Actions Workflow page directly
permissions:
  contents: write # To write the generated contents to the readme

jobs:
  update-readme-with-blog:
    name: Update this repo's README with latest blog posts
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v2
      - uses: gautamkrishnar/blog-post-workflow@master
        with:
          feed_list: "https://dev.to/feed/gautamkrishnar,https://www.gautamkrishnar.com/feed/"

Replace the above url list with your own rss feed urls. See popular-sources for a list of common RSS feed urls.
Commit and wait for it to run automatically or you can also trigger it manually to see the result instantly. To trigger the workflow manually, please follow the steps in the video.

Options

This workflow has additional options that you can use to customize it for your use case. The following are the list of options available:

Option	Default Value	Description	Required
`feed_list`	`""`	Comma-separated list of RSS feed urls, eg: `https://example1.com,https://example2.com`	Yes
`max_post_count`	`5`	Maximum number of posts you want to show on your readme, all feeds combined	No
`readme_path`	`./README.md`	Path of the readme file you want to update	No
`gh_token`	your GitHub token with repo scope	Use this to configure the token of the user that commits the workflow result to GitHub	No
`comment_tag_name`	`BLOG-POST-LIST`	Allows you to override the default comment tag name (`<!-- BLOG-POST-LIST:START --><!-- BLOG-POST-LIST:END -->`), if you want to show multiple instances of the action on the same repo, see advanced usage for more info	No
`disable_sort`	`false`	Disables the sorting of the list based on publish date	No
`template`	`default`	Allows you to change the structure of the posts list by using different variables. By default this workflow uses markdown list format to render the posts, you can override this behavior using this option. Eg: `[$title]($url)` will give you a space-separated list of posts. Supported variables `$title`: Title of the post `$url`: URL of the post `$description`: Description of the post `$newline`: Inserts a newline `$date`: Inserts the post date based on the `date_format` specified `$randomEmoji`: Allow you to use random emojis in the post, pass emojis as the parameter to chose one of it randomly in each post item. Eg: `$randomEmoji(💯,🔥,💫,🚀,🌮)`. See the issue comment for more details `$emojiKey`: You can use this argument to show emojis on each of your post item sequentially in the order you specify. Example: `$emojiKey(💯,🔥,💫)`. See the issue comment for more details	No
`date_format`	`UTC:ddd mmm dd yyyy h:MM TT`	Allows you to change the format of the date or time displayed when using the $date in the template option. This uses NPM dateformat library, please read the library documentation for the supported formats	No
`user_agent`	`rss-parser`	Allows you to customize the user agent used by the RSS feed crawler	No
`accept_header`	`application/rss+xml`	Allows you to customize the accept header of the http requests	No
`tag_post_pre_newline`	`true` if you are not using template option	Allows you to insert a newline before the closing tag and after the opening tag when using the template option if needed, for better formatting	No
`filter_comments`	`medium,stackoverflow/Comment by $author/,stackexchange/Comment by $author/`	Comma separated list of platforms you want to enable the comment filter. Available filters `medium`: Allows you to filter out the Medium comments. Known issue: #37 `stackoverflow/Comment by $author/`: Allows you to filter out the StackOverflow comments. Argument to this filter is optional, it defaults to 'Comment by $author'. If you use any language other than English on StackOverflow, you can use this argument to customize it. See #16 for more info. `stackexchange/Comment by $author/`: Allows you to filter out the StackExchange comments. Argument to this filter follows the same format as `stackoverflow` filter's argument.	No
`custom_tags`	`""`	Allows you to use the custom tags from your feed items in your template. Format: `variableName/tagName/,variableName/tagName/`. Please see the issue comment for more details	No
`title_max_length`	`""`	Allows you to trim the title in the posts list, excess text will be appended with an ellipsis `...`	No
`description_max_length`	`""`	Allows you to trim the description in the posts list, excess text will be appended with an ellipsis `...`	No
`item_exec`	`""`	Allows you to execute custom JavaScript code on each post item fetched from the xml to do advanced text manipulation. Please see the issue comment as an example	No
`commit_message`	`Updated with the latest blog posts`	Allows you to customize the commit message	No
`committer_username`	`blog-post-bot`	Allows you to customize the committer username	No
`committer_email`	`blog-post-bot@example.com`	Allows you to customize the committer email	No
`output_only`	`false`	Sets the generated array as `results` output variable so that it can be consumed in other actions and parsed via utilities like jq. This will also prevent committing to readme. See #51 for more details about the output format and how to use it.	No
`enable_keepalive`	`true`	Workflow will automatically do a dummy commit to keep the repository active if there is no commit activity for the last 50 days. GitHub will stop running all cron based triggers if the repository is not active for more than 60 days. This flag allows you to disable this feature. See #53 for more details.	No
`retry_count`	`0`	Maximum number of times to retry the fetch operation if it fails, See #66 for more details.	No
`retry_wait_time`	`1`	Time to wait before each retry operation in seconds.	No

Advanced usage examples

StackOverflow example

The following configuration allows you to show your latest StackOverflow activity along with your latest blog posts in the Github profile or project readme:

Follow the steps mentioned in the how to use section
Add the following section to your README.md file, you can give whatever title you want. Just make sure that you use  in your readme. The workflow will replace this comment with the actual StackOverflow activity:

# StackOverflow Activity
<!-- STACKOVERFLOW:START -->
<!-- STACKOVERFLOW:END -->

Create stack-overflow-workflow.yml in your workflows folder with the following contents, replace 4214976 with your StackOverflow user id:

name: Latest stack overflow activity
on:
  schedule:
    # Runs every 5 minutes
    - cron: '*/5 * * * *'
  workflow_dispatch:
jobs:
  update-readme-with-stack-overflow:
    name: Update this repo's README with latest activity from StackOverflow
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v2
      - uses: gautamkrishnar/blog-post-workflow@master
        with:
          comment_tag_name: "STACKOVERFLOW"
          commit_message: "Updated readme with the latest stackOverflow data"
          feed_list: "https://stackoverflow.com/feeds/user/4214976"

See the result!

Popular Sources

Following are the list of some popular blogging platforms and their RSS feed urls:

Name	Feed URL	Comments	Example
Dev.to	`https://dev.to/feed/username`	Replace username with your own username	https://dev.to/feed/gautamkrishnar
Wordpress	`https://www.example.com/feed/`	Replace with your own blog url	https://www.gautamkrishnar.com/feed/
Medium	`https://medium.com/feed/@username`	Replace @username with your Medium username	https://medium.com/feed/@khaosdoctor
Medium (Sub Domain)	`https://username.medium.com/feed`	Replace username with your Medium username	https://timsneath.medium.com/feed
Stackoverflow	`https://stackoverflow.com/feeds/user/userid`	Replace with your StackOverflow UserId	https://stackoverflow.com/feeds/user/5283532
StackExchange	`https://subdomain.stackexchange.com/feeds/user/userid`	Replace with your StackExchange UserId and sub-domain	https://devops.stackexchange.com/feeds/user/15
Ghost	`https://www.example.com/rss/`	Replace with your own blog url	https://blog.codinghorror.com/rss/
Drupal	`https://www.example.com/rss.xml`	Replace with your own blog url	https://www.arsenal.com/rss.xml
Youtube Playlists	`https://www.youtube.com/feeds/videos.xml?playlist_id=playlistId`	Replace `playlistId` with your own Youtube playlist id	https://www.youtube.com/feeds/videos.xml?playlist_id=PLJNqgDLpd5E69Kc664st4j7727sbzyx0X
Youtube Channel Video list	`https://www.youtube.com/feeds/videos.xml?channel_id=channelId`	Replace `channelId` with your own Youtube channel id	https://www.youtube.com/feeds/videos.xml?channel_id=UCDCHcqyeQgJ-jVSd6VJkbCw
Anchor.fm Podcasts	`https://anchor.fm/s/podcastId/podcast/rss`	You can get the rss feed url of a podcast by following these instructions	https://anchor.fm/s/1e784a38/podcast/rss
Hashnode	`https://@username.hashnode.dev/rss.xml`	Replace @username with your Hashnode username	https://polilluminato.hashnode.dev/rss.xml
Google Podcasts	`https://podcasts.google.com/feed/channelId`	Replace `channelId` with your Google podcast channel Id	https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5zb3VuZGNsb3VkLmNvbS91c2Vycy9zb3VuZGNsb3VkOnVzZXJzOjYyOTIxMTkwL3NvdW5kcy5yc3M=
Reddit	`http://www.reddit.com/r/topic/.rss`	You can create an RSS feed by adding '.rss' to the end of an existing Reddit URL. Replace `topic` with SubReddit topic that interest you or localized to you.	http://www.reddit.com/r/news/.rss
Analytics India Magazine	`https://analyticsindiamag.com/author/author_name/feed/`	Replace `author_name` with your name	https://analyticsindiamag.com/author/kaustubhgupta1828gmail-com/feed/
Feedburner	`https://feeds.feedburner.com/feed_address`	Replace `feed_address` with your Feedburner feed address	https://feeds.feedburner.com/darkwood-fr/blog
Tumblr	`https://blog_name.tumblr.com/rss` or `https://example.com/rss`	You can create an RSS feed by adding '/rss' to your main blog page or to your own domain if it is configured. Replace `blog_name` with your blog name	https://goggledoddle.tumblr.com/rss

Examples

Update 22-July-2020

Thanks for the overwhelming response everyone, Just added StackOverflow support to the project. Now you can have your dev.to posts along with your StackOverflow activity in your GitHub readme. The action now supports having multiple instances on the same repo. See an example readme:

Latest comments (32)

Neeraj M R • Jul 28 '22

Thanks for helping

Christine Pinto • Jul 23 '21

Thank you for creating this and keeping it up to date.

nelero • Dec 10 '20

I love this idea !

KarthikNayak • Aug 8 '20 • Edited

I wanted to Github activities in my README.md. But I am getting error. How should I add?
I didn't understand what are those secret keys? And how to create one?

Gautam Krishna R • Aug 8 '20

You cant use blog post workflow to show the GitHub activities on your readme. Github don't give you XML data yet via their API. Use github.com/jamesgeorge007/github-a... instead.