PR summaries¶

A GitHub Action comments on each pull request that changes your dbt project. The comment says, in business terms:

which models were added, changed, or removed, and what each now does differently,
which other models are affected downstream,
which business rules the change touches, and
which owners to loop in.

The comment is updated in place on every push, so a pull request only ever has one.

Add it to your repository¶

Create .github/workflows/openpipeline.yml in your dbt repository:

name: OpenPipeline
on:
  pull_request:
    paths: ["models/**", "dbt_project.yml", "openpipeline.yml"]

permissions:
  contents: read
  pull-requests: write

jobs:
  summary:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v7
      - uses: PawanPatil19/openpipeline/actions/pr-summary@v0.1.0
        with:
          project-dir: .   # where dbt_project.yml lives

That is all. By default there is no AI, nothing leaves the runner, and no secret is needed.

The action installs OpenPipeline from its own tag, so the tag you pick decides which version runs. Pin a full version such as @v0.1.0.

The summary is also written to the job's summary page, so it is useful even if you turn comments off with comment: "false".

With an AI overview¶

To add a short plain-words paragraph at the top of the comment, turn on ai and pass an Anthropic API key stored as a repository secret:

      - uses: PawanPatil19/openpipeline/actions/pr-summary@v0.1.0
        with:
          ai: "true"
          anthropic-api-key: ${{ secrets.ANTHROPIC_API_KEY }}

It is off by default. When it is on, the SQL and documentation of the changed models are sent to Anthropic. If the AI call fails, the comment is still posted without the paragraph. See AI explanations for the privacy details.

Inputs¶

Input	Default	What it does
`project-dir`	`.`	Path to the dbt project inside the repository.
`base-ref`	the PR's base branch	Branch or commit to compare against.
`comment`	`"true"`	Post or update a comment. Needs `pull-requests: write`.
`github-token`	the workflow token	Token used to post the comment.
`ai`	`"false"`	Add the AI overview. Needs `anthropic-api-key`.
`anthropic-api-key`	none	Your key. Store it as a secret.

The action also has one output, summary-file, the path to the Markdown file.

Without GitHub¶

The action is a thin wrapper around one command, so you can run it anywhere:

openpipeline review path/to/base path/to/head          # print Markdown
openpipeline review base head -o summary.md            # write a file
openpipeline review base head --ai                     # with the AI overview

base and head are two folders that each hold a version of the project. Check out the base branch into a second folder (for example with git worktree add) and point at both. See the command line reference.

Fork pull requests¶

GitHub gives workflows that run on fork pull requests a read-only token and no secrets. Posting the comment will fail there, and so will the AI overview. If you accept fork pull requests, set comment: "false" for them and read the summary on the job summary page instead.