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4

Builder

Building the project as part of a workflow may help to create mind-space and focus on the project itself.

Use Unity - Builder to automatically build Unity projects for different platforms.

Basic setup

Credentials

Make sure you have set up these variables in the activation step:

UNITY_EMAIL (the email address for your Unity account)
UNITY_PASSWORD (the password that you use to login to Unity)

NOTE: Issues have been observed when using a UNITY_PASSWORD with special characters. It is recommended to use a password without any special characters (mixed-case alphanumeric characters only).

GameCI does not acquire nor store your Unity email or password. They are required for reactivating the license during build and test steps.

Workflow file setup

Create or edit the file called .github/workflows/main.yml and add a job to it.

Personal license

Personal licenses require a one-time manual activation step.

Make sure you acquire and activate your license file, and add it as a secret.

Then, define the build step as follows:

- uses: game-ci/unity-builder@v4
  env:
    UNITY_LICENSE: ${{ secrets.UNITY_LICENSE }}
    UNITY_EMAIL: ${{ secrets.UNITY_EMAIL }}
    UNITY_PASSWORD: ${{ secrets.UNITY_PASSWORD }}
  with:
    targetPlatform: WebGL

Professional license

Make sure you have set up these variables in the activation step:

UNITY_EMAIL (should contain the email address for your Unity account)
UNITY_PASSWORD (the password that you use to login to Unity)
UNITY_SERIAL (the serial provided by Unity)

Then, define the build step as follows:

- uses: game-ci/unity-builder@v4
  env:
    UNITY_EMAIL: ${{ secrets.UNITY_EMAIL }}
    UNITY_PASSWORD: ${{ secrets.UNITY_PASSWORD }}
    UNITY_SERIAL: ${{ secrets.UNITY_SERIAL }}
  with:
    targetPlatform: WebGL

License Server

If you host your own Unity license server internally you can provide its url using unityLicensingServer. A floating license will be acquired before the build, and returned after.

Example of use:

- uses: game-ci/unity-builder@v4
  with:
    targetPlatform: WebGL
    unityLicensingServer: [url to your license server]

That is all you need to build your project.

By default, the enabled scenes from the project's settings will be built.

Storing the build

To be able to access your built files, they need to be uploaded as artifacts. To do this it is recommended to use Github Actions official upload artifact action after any build action.

By default, Builder outputs it's builds to a folder named build.

Example:

- uses: actions/upload-artifact@v3
  with:
    name: Build
    path: build

Builds can now be downloaded as Artifacts in the Actions tab.

Caching

In order to make builds run faster, you can cache Library files from previous builds. To do so simply add Github Actions official cache action before any unity steps.

Example:

- uses: actions/cache@v3
  with:
    path: path/to/your/project/Library
    key: Library-MyProjectName-TargetPlatform
    restore-keys: |
      Library-MyProjectName-
      Library-

This simple addition could speed up your build by more than 50%.

Configuration options

Below options can be specified under with: for the unity-builder action.

targetPlatform

Platform that the build should target.

Must be one of the allowed values listed in the Unity scripting manual.

required: true

unityVersion

Version of Unity to use for building the project. Use "auto" to get from your ProjectSettings/ProjectVersion.txt

required: false default: auto

customImage

Specific docker image that should be used for building the project.

- uses: game-ci/unity-builder@v4
  with:
    customImage: 'unityci/editor:2020.1.14f1-base-0'

required: false default: ""

projectPath

Specify the path to your Unity project to be built. The path should be relative to the root of your repository.

required: false default: <your repository root>

buildProfile

Provide a path to a build profile. The path should be relative to the root of your Unity project (i.e. relative to projectPath). See the Unity documentation for more information on using build profiles.

- uses: game-ci/unity-builder@v4
  with:
    buildProfile: 'Assets/Settings/Build Profiles/WindowsDemo.asset'

required: false default: Unity will do a platform build for the targetPlatform.

buildName

Name of the build. Also the folder in which the build will be stored within buildsPath.

required: false default: <build_target>

buildsPath

Path where the builds should be stored.

In this folder a folder will be created for every targetPlatform.

required: false default: build

buildMethod

Custom command to run your build.

There are two conditions for a custom buildMethod:

Must reference a valid path to a static method.
The class must reside in the Assets/Editor directory (or in an Editor Assembly).

Example:

- uses: game-ci/unity-builder@v4
  with:
    buildMethod: EditorNamespace.BuilderClassName.StaticBuildMethod

To get started with a modified version of the default Unity Builder build script, you can copy BuildScript.cs to your Assets/Editor/UnityBuilderAction directory and reference it:

- uses: game-ci/unity-builder@v4
  with:
    buildMethod: UnityBuilderAction.BuildScript.Build

If you need to pass custom parameters to this build method, see customParameters below.

required: false default: Built-in script that will run a build out of the box.

customParameters

Custom parameters to configure the build.

Parameters must start with a hyphen (-) and may be followed by a value (without hyphen).

Parameters without a value will be considered booleans (with a value of true).

- uses: game-ci/unity-builder@v4
  with:
    customParameters: -profile SomeProfile -someBoolean -someValue exampleValue

There are 2 main use cases:

To pass your own custom parameters to be used with buildMethod above. Note that environment variables set in the workflow file will not be available in the environment running Unity, so use this mechanism instead.
To pass Unity Build Options (for example, customParameters: -standaloneBuildSubtarget Server will do server builds)

required: false default: ""

versioning

Configure a specific versioning strategy

- uses: game-ci/unity-builder@v4
  with:
    versioning: Semantic

Find the available strategies below:

Semantic

Versioning out of the box! (recommended)

Compatible with all platforms. Does not modify your repository. Requires zero configuration.

How it works:

Generates a version based on semantic versioning. Follows <major>.<minor>.<patch> for example 0.17.2. The latest tag dictates <major>.<minor> (defaults to 0.0 for no tag). The number of commits (since the last tag, if any) is used for <patch>. To increment major or minor version, manually add a tag to a commit that follows the <major>.<minor> versioning convention. Optionally, the version number can have a v prefix, for example v0.17.

No configuration required.

Tag

Generates the version based on the git tag of the latest commit (HEAD). For example 0.17.2 will generate the version 0.17.2. A leading "v" is stripped, so a version of v1.3.3 will generate a version of 1.3.3. (advanced users)

Compatible with all platforms. Does not modify your repository.

Custom

Allows specifying a custom version in the version field. (advanced users)

This strategy is useful when your project or pipeline has some kind of orchestration that determines the versions.

None

No version will be set by Builder. (not recommended)

Not recommended unless you generate a new version in a pre-commit hook. Manually setting versions is error-prone.

androidVersionCode

Configure the android versionCode.

When not specified, the version code is generated from the version using the major * 1000000 + minor * 1000 + patch scheme;

androidExportType

Set this flag to androidPackage to build an apk, androidAppBundle for an aab, or androidStudioProject to build an Android Studio Project.

- uses: game-ci/unity-builder@v4
  with:
    androidExportType: 'androidAppBundle'
    androidKeystoreName: user.keystore
    androidKeystoreBase64: ${{ secrets.ANDROID_KEYSTORE_BASE64 }}
    androidKeystorePass: ${{ secrets.ANDROID_KEYSTORE_PASS }}
    androidKeyaliasName: ${{ secrets.ANDROID_KEYALIAS_NAME }}
    androidKeyaliasPass: ${{ secrets.ANDROID_KEYALIAS_PASS }}

You should also set all the Android Keystore options (see below). Refer to this section for keystore setup.

required: false default: androidPackage

androidKeystoreName

Configure the android keystoreName. Must be provided if configuring the below keystore options.

For this to take effect, you must enable Custom Keystore in your Android Player settings. The default build script overrides the other keystore settings with these keystore options.

required: false default: ""

androidKeystoreBase64

Configure the base64 contents of the android keystore file. You should get this with base64 $androidKeystoreName

The contents will be decoded from base64 using echo $androidKeystoreBase64 | base64 --decode > $projectPath/$androidKeystoreName

It is recommended to use GitHub Secrets.

required: false default: ""

androidKeystorePass

Configure the android keystorePass. Recommended to use GitHub Secrets.

required: false default: ""

androidKeyaliasName

Configure the android keyaliasName. Recommended to use GitHub Secrets.

required: false default: ""

androidKeyaliasPass

Configure the android keyaliasPass. Recommended to use GitHub Secrets.

required: false default: ""

androidTargetSdkVersion

Configure the android target API level. If used, must be one of Unity's AndroidSdkVersions.

required: false default: ""

androidSymbolType

Export android symbols alongside the build. Can be set to none, public, or debugging.

required: false default: "none"

sshAgent

SSH Agent path to forward to the container.

This is useful if your manifest has a dependency on a private GitHub repo.

required: false default: ""

sshPublicKeysDirectoryPath

SSH directory path to mount in the container on ~/.ssh. Must be used with sshAgent.

It is recommended to have only public keys in this directory, and rely on sshAgent to manage private keys.

This is useful if your manifest has a dependency on multiple private GitHub repos and you need to use multiple SSH deploy keys.

required: false default: ``

gitPrivateToken

Github private token to pull from github.

This is useful if your manifest has a dependency on a private GitHub repo.

required: false default: ""

runAsHostUser

Run the container as the host user based on the file permissions of the cloned project that gets mounted to the container. This is useful if you are using a self-hosted runner and need the generated files from the container to be owned by the same user as the runner host. This solves most permission errors without requiring the runner agent to run as root. This option shouldn't be needed on Github Hosted runners as the systems are automatically wiped each run so we default to false. Self-Hosted runners generally will want to set this to true.

required: false default: false

chownFilesTo

User and optionally group (user or user:group or uid:gid) to give ownership of the resulting build artifacts.

required: false default: ""

allowDirtyBuild

Allows the branch of the build to be dirty, and still generate the build.

- uses: game-ci/unity-builder@v4
  with:
    allowDirtyBuild: true

Note that it is generally bad practice to modify your branch in a CI Pipeline. However there are exceptions where this might be needed. (use with care).

required: false default: false

unityLicensingServer

Sets the url to a unity license server for acquiring floating licenses.

required: false default: ""

cacheUnityInstallationOnMac

Enables caching the Unity Hub and Editor installation for MacOS runners. This can significantly reduce project build times if you have enough available cache on Github Actions.

required: false default: false

unityHubVersionOnMac

Allows pinning the Unity Hub version used on MacOS runners. Should be of format Major.Minor.Patch, ie 3.4.0. An empty string represents the latest available version on homebrew.

required: false default: ""

dockerWorkspacePath

Allows customizing the build path within the container in case there are hardcoded paths generated during the build. For example building an IOS XCode project on Linux and moving to a new path on MacOS occasionally leads to broken paths requiring this override to ensure the paths match.

Paths should be of format /path/to/build, ie /tmp/build. On Windows, leave off the drive letter specification. For example C:\build becomes /build. There should be no trailing slash in the path and the path should be absolute. The path will automatically be created within the container if it does not exist. It is recommended to use a path that doesn't already exist within the container to avoid any conflicts.

required: false default: "/github/workspace"

dockerCpuLimit

Number of CPU cores to assign to the Docker container. Defaults to all available cores when no value is specified. Can accept fractional values, e.g., 0.5 for half of a CPU core's execution time.

required: false default: ""

dockerMemoryLimit

Amount of memory to assign to the Docker container. Defaults to 95% of total system memory rounded down to the nearest megabyte on Linux and 80% on Windows. If the platform is unrecognized, it defaults to 75% of total system memory. To manually specify a value, use the format <number><unit>. The units can be:

m: Megabytes (e.g., 512m = 512 megabytes)
g: Gigabytes (e.g., 4g = 4 gigabytes)

required: false default: ""

dockerIsolationMode

Isolation mode to use for the Docker container when running on Windows. Can be one of:

process
hyperv
default: This mode will choose the recommended mode as described by Microsoft. Server versions will use process, while desktop versions will use hyperv.

required: false default: "default"

containerRegistryRepository

Container registry and repository to pull the image from. Only applicable if customImage is not set.

This allows you to host your own images and still leverage the logic to automatically determine the editor version and target platform. Accepts images from other registries too, for example ghcr.io/namespace/imagename for Github Container Registry.

required: false default: "unityci/editor"

containerRegistryImageVersion

Container registry image version. Only applicable if customImage is not set.

This allows you to roll back the image version to a previous version if needed or even use your own version numbering for custom built and maintained registries.

required: false default: "3"

skipActivation

Skips the activation step. This is useful for Mac self-hosted runners as the Unity process runs on the host so activation/deactivation can conflict with parallel running jobs. This should only be used for Mac self-hosted runners that already have a license activated. Running in any other configuration will result in a failed build due to inactive licenses.

required: false default: false

enableGpu

Omits passing the -nographics parameter when launching Unity to perform the build. Useful when using runners that have GPU available, and your build process utilizes Unity's graphics API during build. MacOS only.

required: false default: false

Outputs

Below are outputs that can be accessed by using ${{ steps.myBuildStep.outputs.outputName }}, where myBuildStep is the id of the Builder step, and outputName is the name of the output.

buildVersion

Returns the version that was generated by Builder, following the strategy configured for versioning.

- uses: game-ci/unity-builder@v4
  id: myBuildStep
- run: echo 'Project Version: ${{ steps.myBuildStep.outputs.buildVersion }}'

androidVersionCode

Returns the version code that was generated by Builder for Android builds.

- uses: game-ci/unity-builder@v4
  id: myBuildStep
- run: echo 'Android Version Code: ${{ steps.myBuildStep.outputs.androidVersionCode }}'

engineExitCode

Returns the exit code from the build scripts. This code is 0 if the build was successful. If there was an error during activation, the code is from the activation step. If activation is successful, the code is from the project build step.

- uses: game-ci/unity-builder@v4
  id: myBuildStep
- run: echo 'Build Step Exit Code: ${{ steps.myBuildStep.outputs.engineExitCode }}'

Private Github repositories

If you use private git repository in your packages/manifest.json, you need to create SSH pub/private keys for your project and then add to the webfactory/ssh-agent

Generate public,private key for github's SSH using this instruction and make sure that you you use git@github.com:USER/PROJECT.git instead of email for -C parameter because we're going to use it as deploy key for a single project and webfactory/ssh-agent going to use that for checking which repository this key is related to .
Add the public_key to Deploy settings of your private git repository (https://github.com/USER/PROJECT/settings/keys)
Add private_key to Github secrets of the project that you want to build (https://github.com/USER/PROJECT/settings/secrets/actions) (key name should be SSH_PRIVATE_KEY )
Add github to ssh known hosts :

name: 'Add GitHub to the SSH known hosts file'
run: |
  mkdir -p -m 0700 /home/runner/.ssh
  curl --silent https://api.github.com/meta | jq --raw-output '"github.com "+.ssh_keys[]' >> /home/runner/.ssh/known_hosts
  chmod 600 /home/runner/.ssh/known_hosts

Finally, add webfactory/ssh-agent to your Github action :

name: Accessing private repos
runs-on: ubuntu-latest
steps:
  - uses: actions/checkout@v4
  - uses: webfactory/ssh-agent@v0.8.0
    with:
      ssh-private-key: ${{ secrets.SSH_PRIVATE_KEY }}
  - uses: game-ci/unity-builder@v4
    with:
      sshAgent: ${{ env.SSH_AUTH_SOCK }}

Multiple private Github repositories

GitHub Deploy Keys are SSH keys that can only be set up on repository level. If you have multiple private repositories in your packages/manifest.json, you will need to add a Github Deploy Key for each one, and use the webfactory/ssh-agent action to manage them and use the right SSH key for each repository.

In order for webfactory/ssh-agent to work inside the container, you will need to upload the public keys, SSH config and set the git url mirroring configurations in the container. You can do that by using sshPublicKeysDirectoryPath and setting the GIT_CONFIG_EXTENSIONS environment variable:

- uses: webfactory/ssh-agent@v0.8.0
  with:
    ssh-private-key: |
      ${{ secrets.FIRST_KEY }}
      ${{ secrets.NEXT_KEY }}
      ${{ secrets.ANOTHER_KEY }}

- name: Prepare SSH config for unity builder
  run: |
    mkdir $HOME/.ssh_docker
    cp $HOME/.ssh/config $HOME/.ssh_docker/
    cp $HOME/.ssh/key* $HOME/.ssh_docker/
    cp $HOME/.ssh/known_hosts $HOME/.ssh_docker/
    sed -i 's/\/home\/runner/\/root/g' $HOME/.ssh_docker/config
    sudo chown -R root:root $HOME/.ssh_docker
    GIT_CONFIG_EXTENSIONS=$(git config --list | grep '^url\.')
    {
      echo 'GIT_CONFIG_EXTENSIONS<<EOF'
      echo "$GIT_CONFIG_EXTENSIONS"
      echo EOF
    } >> "$GITHUB_ENV"
  shell: bash

- uses: game-ci/unity-builder@v4
  with:
    sshAgent: ${{ env.SSH_AUTH_SOCK }}
    sshPublicKeysDirectoryPath: ${{ env.HOME }}/.ssh_docker

UPM authentication using .upmconfig.toml

Unity requires an .upmconfig.toml to exist in the home directory to authenticate and download packages from private UPM registries. To create this file, first create the /home/runner/work/_temp/_github_home directory, and then create the .upmconfig.toml file inside that directory. This action must be done before running the game-ci/unity-builder@v4 action.

- name: Create .upmconfig.toml UPM authentication file
  run: |
    mkdir /home/runner/work/_temp/_github_home
    cd /home/runner/work/_temp/_github_home
    echo "[npmAuth.\"https://upm.example.com\"]" >> .upmconfig.toml
    echo "alwaysAuth = true" >> .upmconfig.toml
    echo "token = \"${{ secrets.NPM_TOKEN }}\"" >> .upmconfig.toml

Using preprocessor macros

If needed, Unity preprocessor directives can be set by adding a step to the build.

steps:
  - name: Apply csc.rsp (pre-processor symbols)
    run: echo -define:MY_SYMBOL >> Assets/csc.rsp

To avoid warnings about "unapplied changes", add Assets/csc.rsp in your .gitignore

Once set, you can then reference these preprocessor directives in code:

void Start() {
#if MY_SYMBOL
  GetComponent<TMP_Text>().text = "I have a symbol!";
#else
  GetComponent<TMP_Text>().text = "I do not have a symbol...";
#endif
}

Complete example

A complete workflow that builds every available platform could look like this:

name: Build project

on: [push, pull_request]

jobs:
  buildForAllSupportedPlatforms:
    name: Build for ${{ matrix.targetPlatform }}
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    strategy:
      fail-fast: false
      matrix:
        targetPlatform:
          - StandaloneOSX # Build a macOS standalone (Intel 64-bit).
          - StandaloneWindows # Build a Windows standalone.
          - StandaloneWindows64 # Build a Windows 64-bit standalone.
          - StandaloneLinux64 # Build a Linux 64-bit standalone.
          - iOS # Build an iOS player.
          - Android # Build an Android .apk standalone app.
          - WebGL # WebGL.
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v4
        with:
          fetch-depth: 0
          lfs: true
      - uses: actions/cache@v3
        with:
          path: Library
          key: Library-${{ matrix.targetPlatform }}
          restore-keys: Library-
      - if: matrix.targetPlatform == 'Android'
        uses: jlumbroso/free-disk-space@v1.3.1
      - uses: game-ci/unity-builder@v4
        env:
          UNITY_LICENSE: ${{ secrets.UNITY_LICENSE }}
          UNITY_EMAIL: ${{ secrets.UNITY_EMAIL }}
          UNITY_PASSWORD: ${{ secrets.UNITY_PASSWORD }}
        with:
          targetPlatform: ${{ matrix.targetPlatform }}
      - uses: actions/upload-artifact@v3
        with:
          name: Build-${{ matrix.targetPlatform }}
          path: build/${{ matrix.targetPlatform }}

Next steps

You can find more workflow examples in Getting Started.

FilesExpand file tree

04-builder.mdx

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04-builder.mdx

File metadata and controls

Builder

Basic setup

Credentials

Workflow file setup

Personal license

Professional license

License Server

Storing the build

Caching

Configuration options

targetPlatform

unityVersion

customImage

projectPath

buildProfile

buildName

buildsPath

buildMethod

customParameters

versioning

Semantic

Tag

Custom

None

androidVersionCode

androidExportType

androidKeystoreName

androidKeystoreBase64

androidKeystorePass

androidKeyaliasName

androidKeyaliasPass

androidTargetSdkVersion

androidSymbolType

sshAgent

sshPublicKeysDirectoryPath

gitPrivateToken

runAsHostUser

chownFilesTo

allowDirtyBuild

unityLicensingServer

cacheUnityInstallationOnMac

unityHubVersionOnMac

dockerWorkspacePath

dockerCpuLimit

dockerMemoryLimit

dockerIsolationMode

containerRegistryRepository

containerRegistryImageVersion

skipActivation

enableGpu

Outputs

buildVersion

androidVersionCode

engineExitCode

Private Github repositories

Multiple private Github repositories

UPM authentication using .upmconfig.toml

Using preprocessor macros

Complete example

Next steps