whatisgithub

What is cccc-action?

moznion/cccc-action — explained in plain English

Analysis updated 2026-05-18

0ShellAudience · ops devopsComplexity · 2/5LicenseSetup · easy

In one sentence

A GitHub Actions add-on that installs and runs a code complexity checker so a project's CI pipeline can catch overly complicated code automatically.

Mindmap

mindmap
  root((cccc-action))
    What it does
      Installs cccc binary
      Runs complexity gate
      Caches results
    Tech stack
      Shell
      GitHub Actions
      cccc binary
    Use cases
      CI complexity gate
      Multi-language checks
      Faster repeated CI runs
    Audience
      Developers
      DevOps engineers

Code map

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filefunction / class

What do people build with it?

USE CASE 1

Fail a CI build automatically when a function's code complexity exceeds a set limit.

USE CASE 2

Check code complexity across TypeScript, Rust, Go, or PHP files in one workflow step.

USE CASE 3

Speed up repeated CI runs by caching complexity results between workflow runs.

USE CASE 4

Install the cccc binary in a workflow to run custom complexity commands yourself.

What is it built with?

ShellGitHub Actionscccc

How does it compare?

moznion/cccc-action123satyajeet123/bitnet-serveradeilsonrbrito/cross-model-consult
Stars000
LanguageShellShellShell
Setup difficultyeasyeasymoderate
Complexity2/52/53/5
Audienceops devopsdeveloperdeveloper

Figures from each repo's GitHub metadata at analysis time.

How do you get it running?

Difficulty · easy Time to first run · 5min

Add the action to a workflow YAML file, per-language rules and thresholds go in a committed cccc.toml file.

Released under the MIT License, which allows free use, modification, and commercial use as long as the original copyright notice is kept.

So what is it?

cccc-action is a GitHub Actions add-on that installs and runs a code complexity checker called cccc inside a project's continuous integration pipeline. cccc itself is a separate tool that measures how complicated pieces of code are, using two well known measurements from software engineering called Cognitive Complexity and Cyclomatic Complexity, and it works across TypeScript, JavaScript, Rust, Go, and PHP code. This action downloads the correct version of the cccc program for whichever operating system and processor type the CI job is running on, checks that the download matches its expected checksum for safety, and adds it to the system so it can be run as a command. If you tell the action which folder or files to look at, it will also run the complexity check right there in the workflow and can fail the build if code is too complicated according to rules you have set. Rather than letting users configure complexity rules directly through GitHub Actions settings, the action deliberately pushes all of that configuration into a single file in the project itself, called cccc.toml. That file controls which languages to check, which files to skip, complexity limits that should fail a build, and more. The idea is to avoid the action and the underlying tool drifting out of sync as options change over time. There is also a caching feature: turning on one setting in that same config file lets the action reuse results from a previous run so unchanged files do not need to be rechecked every single time, which can make repeated runs several times faster on larger codebases. The action also supports a simpler install-only mode, where it just puts the cccc binary on the system path and lets you run it yourself with whatever command line options you like, plus an escape hatch to pass extra raw options directly. This tool is aimed at software developers and teams who want to enforce a complexity limit on their code as part of their GitHub Actions based CI setup. It supports Ubuntu, macOS, and Windows runners, and is released under the MIT license.

Copy-paste prompts

Prompt 1
Show me how to add cccc-action to a GitHub Actions workflow to gate on code complexity.
Prompt 2
Help me write a cccc.toml config that sets max cognitive and cyclomatic complexity thresholds.
Prompt 3
Explain the difference between Cognitive Complexity and Cyclomatic Complexity that cccc measures.
Prompt 4
How do I enable result caching for cccc-action to speed up my CI runs?

Frequently asked questions

What is cccc-action?

A GitHub Actions add-on that installs and runs a code complexity checker so a project's CI pipeline can catch overly complicated code automatically.

What language is cccc-action written in?

Mainly Shell. The stack also includes Shell, GitHub Actions, cccc.

What license does cccc-action use?

Released under the MIT License, which allows free use, modification, and commercial use as long as the original copyright notice is kept.

How hard is cccc-action to set up?

Setup difficulty is rated easy, with roughly 5min to a first successful run.

Who is cccc-action for?

Mainly ops devops.

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