How to Handle a Slash Command With repository_dispatch in GitHub Actions

A repository_dispatch workflow receives the command name as an event type and the parsed arguments in github.event.client_payload.

slash-command-dispatch fires a repository_dispatch with event_type of <command>-command. Match it with on.repository_dispatch.types and read the PR context from client_payload.

Steps

• Trigger on repository_dispatch with types: [deploy-command].
• Read the PR number from github.event.client_payload.
• Run the command logic against that PR.

Handler workflow

on:
  repository_dispatch:
    types: [deploy-command]
jobs:
  deploy:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - env:
          PR: ${{ github.event.client_payload.pull_request.number }}
          REF: ${{ github.event.client_payload.pull_request.head.sha }}
        run: ./deploy.sh --pr "$PR" --sha "$REF"

Gotchas

• The dispatcher already checked permissions, but a standalone repository_dispatch handler must not be triggerable by unauthorized API calls; require a scoped token.
• client_payload carries the slash command args and the PR object populated by the dispatcher.
• repository_dispatch workflows always run from the default branch.

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