rust-ci

Shared GitHub Actions composite actions for Rust repositories in the bitcoincore-dev org. The goal is one place to define how we install Rust, normalize CI for crates.io builds, and operate safely on self-hosted runners (disk and Cargo caches).

This repository has no crates—only reusable workflow building blocks. Workflows reference actions with:

uses: bitcoincore-dev/rust-ci/<action-name>@main

(or a pinned SHA for reproducibility).

Actions

install-rust-toolchain

Wraps dtolnay/rust-toolchain with an org default pinned toolchain when you do not use a repo rust-toolchain.toml.

Input	Role
toolchain	Version string (default 1.88.0). Ignored if toolchain-file is set.
toolchain-file	Path to rust-toolchain.toml or rust-toolchain; channel comes from that file.
components	Extra components (rustfmt, clippy, …). With toolchain-file, comma-separated for dtolnay; otherwise passed to rustup component add after the pinned install.

Use toolchain-file when the repo owns the channel; use the default pin when you want org-wide consistency without per-repo files.

Self-hosted runners (shared disk, concurrent jobs): If you see rustc: Text file busy (exit 126 / ETXTBSY) during install-rust-toolchain, rustup is usually replacing the ~/.cargo/bin proxies while another job is executing them. This action exports RUSTUP_PERMIT_COPY_RENAME and RUSTUP_NO_SELF_UPDATE for all steps so file updates use a safer pattern and rustup does not self-update mid-job.

Multiple listeners, one Unix user (e.g. Zeus zeus-workstation + zeus-workstation-2): Both services often run as github-runner with the same HOME=/var/lib/github-runner, so concurrent jobs on different listeners still collide on ~/.cargo/bin/cargo. Fix at the host:

1. packaging/github-runner/runner-toolchain-isolation.conf — systemd drop-in per extra listener (HOME / CARGO_HOME / RUSTUP_HOME under e.g. /var/lib/github-runner-2).
2. packaging/github-runner/bootstrap-isolated-runner-toolchain.sh — one-time seed of rustup + cargo-audit for that home.
3. Workflows: isolate-cargo-env per job + invoke cargo-audit (not cargo audit) when auditing; pre-install audit on the runner so jobs skip cargo install.

If flakes persist after host isolation, reduce parallelism (workflow concurrency) or use fully job-local RUSTUP_HOME (slower: reinstalls toolchain per job).

strip-patch-crates-io

Removes [patch.crates-io] sections from Cargo.toml and .cargo/config.toml under a chosen directory so CI resolves dependencies from crates.io instead of local path overrides (typical monorepo / path-dev setup).

Input	Role
working-directory	Root to search (default .).

Run this before cargo fetch / cargo build in workflows that must behave like downstream crates.io consumers.

runner-disk-guard (self-hosted)

If root filesystem (/) or the filesystem containing cache-root is above a threshold, prunes old cache-root subtrees (default age 7 days, maxdepth 2) so long-lived runners do not fill the disk. That includes the common case where /tmp is a small tmpfs, cache-root defaults to /tmp/runner-cache, and / still has free space—previously the guard only looked at / and would never prune.

Input	Role
cache-root	Directory to prune when over threshold.
threshold-percent	Trigger cleanup when either measured use exceeds this percent (default 80).
show-df	If true, log df -h before/after when cleanup runs.

isolate-cargo-env (self-hosted)

Sets CARGO_HOME to ${RUNNER_TEMP}/<subdir> (default cargo) and prepends $CARGO_HOME/bin to PATH. Symlinks registry and git to the runner user's shared store (default $HOME/.cargo/...) so per-job metadata stays isolated without duplicating downloaded crates.

Use early in the job, before install-rust-toolchain / cargo install, on workflows that run on shared self-hosted users. Pairs with runner-cargo-cache (restore still populates the shared registry; isolated CARGO_HOME picks it up via symlink).

Input	Role
cargo-home-subdir	Subdir under RUNNER_TEMP (default cargo).
shared-registry	Override registry symlink target (default $HOME/.cargo/registry).
shared-git	Override git symlink target (default $HOME/.cargo/git).

runner-cargo-cache (self-hosted)

Manages persistent Cargo/registry/git and optional target caches on the runner: bind environment variables from a cache key, restore before builds, save after builds, or prune old cache directories.

Input	Role
operation	bind-env | restore | save | prune (required).
cache-key	Segment used to isolate cache trees (required for bind-env).
cache-root	Root for cache dirs (default /tmp/runner-cache).
include-target	For bind-env, whether to set TARGET_CACHE_DIR.
save-target-only	For save, only sync ./target (no registry/git).

Typical sequence: bind-env → restore → build → save (and occasional prune in maintenance jobs).

setup-blvm-spec

Clones the blvm-spec (Orange Paper) repository for spec-lock verification, mdBook includes, or any job that needs spec markdown on disk.

Input	Role
working-directory	Repo root for path resolution (default .).
target	Empty (default): clone to ../blvm-spec (sibling of the checked-out repo), matching cargo-spec-lock verify --spec-path ../blvm-spec/.... Set to a path relative to the repo (e.g. modules/blvm-spec) for in-tree checkouts.
repository	Git URL (default official blvm-spec repo).
depth	Shallow clone depth (default 1).

Typical usage

GitHub-hosted: install-rust-toolchain and often strip-patch-crates-io are enough.

Self-hosted: add runner-disk-guard early in the job, and use runner-cargo-cache around the compile steps so repeated builds stay fast without unbounded disk growth.

Self-hosted runners: cache location (avoid filling tmpfs /tmp)

Default cache-root is /tmp/runner-cache. On many Linux setups /tmp is tmpfs (RAM). Cargo/registry + target caches can grow to tens of GiB and fill /tmp entirely, breaking anything that writes there (e.g. rustup’s rustup-init download). / may still have plenty of space.

Do one of the following (recommended: A).

A. Symlink the default path to real disk (no workflow edits)

Pick a directory on a large persistent volume (example: /mnt/data/github-runner-cache). Workflows that keep the default /tmp/runner-cache will follow the symlink and use disk.

1. Find and stop the runner service(s) (units look like actions.runner.<org>-<repo>.<hostname>.service). Stop every enabled runner on this machine:

   systemctl list-unit-files --no-legend \
     | awk '/^actions\.runner\..*\.service/ && $2 == "enabled" {print $1}'

   systemctl list-unit-files --no-legend \
     | awk '/^actions\.runner\..*\.service/ && $2 == "enabled" {print $1}' \
     | xargs -r sudo systemctl stop

   Wait until jobs drain; optionally confirm nothing is writing the cache:
   sudo lsof +D /tmp/runner-cache 2>/dev/null | head (empty is ideal).

2. Find the Unix user (and group) the runner runs as (needed for chown and the write test). Use any enabled actions.runner unit (after stop, list-units may omit idle services, so use unit files):

   UNIT=$(systemctl list-unit-files --no-legend \
     | awk '/^actions\.runner\..*\.service/ && $2 == "enabled" {print $1; exit}')
   systemctl cat "$UNIT" | grep -E '^User=|^Group='

   If Group= is missing, use the same name as User= for RUNNER_GROUP, or id -gn RUNNER_USER. Put those in place of RUNNER_USER / RUNNER_GROUP in step 3 and 6.

3. Create the disk directory, migrate cache, replace /tmp/runner-cache with a symlink

   If /tmp/runner-cache is already a symlink, rm -rf /tmp/runner-cache only removes the link (not the target). If it is a real directory, this deletes/recreates the path under /tmp.

   DISK_CACHE=/mnt/data/github-runner-cache   # change to your volume
   sudo mkdir -p "$DISK_CACHE"
   
   if [ -d /tmp/runner-cache ] && [ ! -L /tmp/runner-cache ]; then
     sudo rsync -a /tmp/runner-cache/ "$DISK_CACHE/"
   elif [ -L /tmp/runner-cache ]; then
     echo "Existing symlink: $(readlink -f /tmp/runner-cache) — copy from there if you still want migration."
   fi
   
   sudo rm -rf /tmp/runner-cache
   sudo ln -s "$DISK_CACHE" /tmp/runner-cache
   
   sudo chown -R RUNNER_USER:RUNNER_GROUP "$DISK_CACHE"

   Replace RUNNER_USER:RUNNER_GROUP with the values from step 2 (e.g. josh:josh or runner:runner).

4. Optional — SELinux (enforcing): if the new path is not on a typical home/data label, you may need a context the runner can write, e.g. after policy review:

   sudo semanage fcontext -a -t var_lib_t "/mnt/data/github-runner-cache(/.*)?" 2>/dev/null || true
   sudo restorecon -RFv /mnt/data/github-runner-cache

   Use the same path as DISK_CACHE in step 3. Adjust the SELinux type to match your distribution if the journal still shows denials.

5. Start the runner(s) again

   Prefer starting the same unit names you stopped in step 1. If you did not record them, start every enabled runner service:

   systemctl list-unit-files --no-legend \
     | awk '/^actions\.runner\..*\.service/ && $2 == "enabled" {print $1}' \
     | xargs -r sudo systemctl start

6. Verify (replace RUNNER_USER — same as step 2)

   readlink -f /tmp/runner-cache          # should print your DISK_CACHE path
   df -P /tmp/runner-cache                # should show the disk filesystem, not tmpfs
   sudo -u RUNNER_USER sh -c 'touch /tmp/runner-cache/.write-test && rm /tmp/runner-cache/.write-test'

Notes

• several runners on one host — they usually share the same default /tmp/runner-cache; one symlink updates all of them.
• No systemd (you only run ./run.sh / runsvc.sh) — stop those processes, perform steps 3–4 as the same user that runs the runner (skip systemctl; use chown -R only if you created the tree as root), then start the listener again.

B. Set cache-root (and disk-guard’s cache-root) to a disk path

Use the same directory in runner-cargo-cache and runner-disk-guard inputs (org Variables help). No symlink; every workflow must pass the path (or inherit from a reusable workflow).

C. Host maintenance

• Cron or a nightly job can run runner-cargo-cache with operation: prune (same cache-root).
• TMPDIR on disk: for systemd runners, add e.g. Environment=TMPDIR=/var/tmp via systemctl edit <actions.runner.unit> so rustup and other tools avoid a full tmpfs. Create /var/tmp (or your choice) with normal permissions if needed.

Contributing

Changes here affect every workflow that pins @main (or your tag). Prefer small, backward-compatible input defaults; document new inputs in each action’s action.yml and update this README when behavior or defaults change.