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Azure DevOps Pull Request

Description

The azuredevops/pullrequest action opens (or updates) an Azure DevOps pull request once a target linked to the same scm has changed something and the change has been pushed.

It is the second half of the Azure DevOps workflow: the azuredevops scm commits to a working branch and pushes it, this action turns that branch into a pull request. Without it, the branch is pushed and nothing else happens.

The scm may be either azuredevops or azuredevopssearch; with the latter, one pull request is opened per discovered repository.

Requirements

An action never runs on its own: it needs an scmid pointing at an scm declared in the same manifest, and that scm must be of the matching kind. Both are checked when the manifest loads:

missing value for parameter(s) ["scmid"]
scm of kind "git" is not compatible with action of kind "github/pullrequest"

The action then reuses that scm rather than being configured twice. From it, it inherits:

FieldInherited value

sourcebranch

The working branch the scm created and pushed - the branch carrying the changes.

targetbranch

The scm’s branch - the branch the pull request is opened against.

owner, repository

The repository the scm points at.

credentials, URL

Whatever the scm was given, when the action does not set its own.

Every one of these can be overridden in the action spec, but there is rarely a good reason to: a mismatch between the branch the scm pushed and the branch the action opens the request from produces a request with no changes in it.

Where the title comes from

The title is resolved from the first of these that is set:

  1. spec.title on the action

  2. title on the action itself, one level above spec

  3. the name of the associated target, when there is exactly one

  4. the pipeline name

The second form is the usual one:

actions:
  default:
    kind: <the action kind>
    scmid: default
    title: 'deps: bump axios version'

Create or update

Updatecli looks for a request already open between the same two branches before creating one, so running the same pipeline repeatedly gives you one long-lived request per pipeline and repository rather than one per run. Whether that existing request is then refreshed with the latest title and description differs by plugin (each page says which).

Creation is also skipped, without failing the pipeline, when either branch is missing from the remote. Updatecli attempts it on every run regardless, so that a request closed by hand or lost to an earlier failure gets reopened on the next one.

Pipeline URL

When Updatecli detects that it runs inside a CI job, it appends a link to that job in the request description. Set disablepipelineurl: true on the action (next to kind and scmid, not inside spec) to leave it out.

Detection is limited to three engines, each recognised by one environment variable: Jenkins (JENKINS_URL), GitLab CI (GITLAB_CI), and GitHub Actions (GITHUB_ACTION), checked in that order. Anywhere else no link is added, whatever this setting says.

On top of the scm’s credentials, this action also falls back to UPDATECLI_AZURE_DEVOPS_TOKEN and UPDATECLI_AZURE_DEVOPS_USERNAME when neither its own spec nor the scm provides them. See the Azure DevOps scm authentication section.

Parameters

NameTypeDescriptionRequired
bodystring“body” defines a custom pull request body.
draftboolean“draft” defines if the pull request should be created as draft.
organizationstringOrganization defines the Azure DevOps organization URL to interact with.
projectstring“project” defines the Azure DevOps project containing the repository.
repositorystring“repository” defines the Azure DevOps repository name.
sourcebranchstring“sourcebranch” defines the source branch used to create the pull request.
targetbranchstring“targetbranch” defines the target branch used to create the pull request.
titlestring“title” defines the pull request title.
tokenstring“token” specifies the personal access token used to authenticate with Azure DevOps.
urlstring“url” defines the Azure DevOps organization URL to interact with.
usernamestring“username” defines the username used for git authentication.

The spec is small - title, body, and draft, on top of the identity fields inherited from the scm. Reviewers, labels, and merge automation are not exposed here; branch policies on the target branch cover most of what they would do.

Where they do not, say so on the Updatecli issue tracker (these fields are unimplemented rather than deliberately left out, and interest is what gets them prioritised).

draft

Opens the pull request as a draft, leaving it out of reviewers' queues until published.

body

Replaces the description Updatecli generates from the pipeline run.

Cleanup

This plugin implements cleanup: on updatecli apply, a pull request that no longer carries any change is closed automatically rather than left open. Among the action plugins, only this one and github/pullrequest do so.

Example

# updatecli.yaml
name: Update a file and open an Azure DevOps Pull Request

scms:
  default:
    kind: azuredevops
    spec:
      organization: myorg
      project: myproject
      repository: myrepo
      branch: main
      token: '{{ requiredEnv "UPDATECLI_AZURE_DEVOPS_TOKEN" }}'
      username: '{{ requiredEnv "UPDATECLI_AZURE_DEVOPS_USERNAME" }}'
      user: updatecli
      email: updatecli@example.com

sources:
  golang:
    name: Get the latest Golang version
    kind: golang
    spec:
      versionfilter:
        kind: semver
        pattern: "1.24.x"

targets:
  golang-version:
    name: 'deps(golang): Bump Golang version to {{ source "golang" }}'
    kind: yaml
    scmid: default
    spec:
      file: .github/workflows/*.yaml
      key: '$.jobs.build.steps[?(@.uses =~ /^actions\/setup-go/)].with.go-version'
      searchpattern: true

actions:
  default:
    kind: azuredevops/pullrequest
    scmid: default
    spec:
      title: 'deps(golang): Bump Golang version'

Links

Last updated on July 30, 2026
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