diff --git a/README.md b/README.md index 9c21246..503987b 100644 --- a/README.md +++ b/README.md @@ -248,10 +248,10 @@ A cache today is immutable and cannot be updated. But some use cases require the #### Use cache across feature branches Reusing cache across feature branches is not allowed today to provide cache [isolation](https://docs.github.com/en/actions/using-workflows/caching-dependencies-to-speed-up-workflows#restrictions-for-accessing-a-cache). However if both feature branches are from the default branch, a good way to achieve this is to ensure that the default branch has a cache. This cache will then be consumable by both feature branches. -#### Improving cache restore performance on Windows -Currently, cache restore is slow on Windows due to both tar being slow and the compression algorithm being used is `gzip`. Zstd was disabled on windows due to issues with bsd tar(libarchive) which is the tar implementation in use on Windows. To improve cache restore performance, we can re-enable `zstd` as the compression algorithm using the following workaround by using GNU tar instead. +#### Improving cache restore performance on Windows/Using cross-os caching +Currently, cache restore is slow on Windows due to tar being inherently slow and the compression algorithm `gzip` in use. `zstd` is the default algorithm in use on linux and macos. It was disabled on Windows due to issues with bsd tar(libarchive), the tar implementation in use on Windows. -Add the following step to your workflow before the cache step: +To improve cache restore performance, we can re-enable `zstd` as the compression algorithm using the following workaround. Add the following step to your workflow before the cache step: ```yaml - if: ${{ runner.os == 'Windows' }} @@ -262,8 +262,9 @@ Add the following step to your workflow before the cache step: echo C:\Program Files\Git\usr\bin>>"%GITHUB_PATH%" ``` -This should work on all Github Hosted runners as it is. For self-hosted runners, please ensure you have GNU tar and `zstd` installed. +The `cache` action will use GNU tar instead of bsd tar on Windows. This should work on all Github Hosted runners as it is. For self-hosted runners, please ensure you have GNU tar and `zstd` installed. +The above workaround is also needed if you wish to use cross-os caching since difference of compression algorithms will result in different cache versions for the same cache key. So the above workaround will ensure `zstd` is used for caching on all platforms thus resulting in the same cache version for the same cache key. ## Contributing We would love for you to contribute to `actions/cache`, pull requests are welcome! Please see the [CONTRIBUTING.md](CONTRIBUTING.md) for more information.