🗄️ OpenMetadata Sync — GitHub Action

Automatically sync metadata from your schema files to OpenMetadata on every Pull Request.

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The Problem

Every time a developer updates a dbt model, SQL schema, or JSON schema file, someone has to manually update the data catalog in OpenMetadata. This never happens consistently, leading to a stale, unreliable catalog.

The Solution

This GitHub Action automatically syncs metadata from your schema files to OpenMetadata every time a PR is opened or updated. Zero manual effort. Always up to date.

Developer updates orders.yml in a PR
           ↓
GitHub Action triggers automatically
           ↓
Parses changed schema files
           ↓
Diffs against current OpenMetadata state
           ↓
Pushes only what changed via REST API
           ↓
Posts a summary comment on the PR ✅

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Supported File Types

Format	Example	What's Extracted
dbt YAML	models/orders.yml	descriptions, tags, owners, column metadata
SQL	schema/orders.sql	table name, columns, types, comment-based metadata
JSON Schema	schemas/orders.json	all standard JSON Schema fields + x-owner, x-tags

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Quick Start

Step 1 — Add secrets to your GitHub repo

Go to your repo → Settings → Secrets and variables → Actions and add:

Secret	Description
OPENMETADATA_HOST	Your OpenMetadata URL e.g. http://your-server:8585
OPENMETADATA_TOKEN	JWT token from OpenMetadata Settings → Bots
OM_SERVICE_NAME	The Database Service name in OpenMetadata

Step 2 — Add the workflow file

Create .github/workflows/openmetadata-sync.yml in your repo:

name: Sync Metadata to OpenMetadata

on:
  pull_request:
    paths: ['**.yml', '**.yaml', '**.sql', '**.json']

jobs:
  sync-metadata:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    permissions:
      contents: read
      pull-requests: write
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v4
        with:
          fetch-depth: 0

      - uses: your-username/openmetadata-sync-action@v1
        with:
          openmetadata_host: ${{ secrets.OPENMETADATA_HOST }}
          openmetadata_token: ${{ secrets.OPENMETADATA_TOKEN }}
          github_token: ${{ secrets.GITHUB_TOKEN }}
          database_service_name: ${{ secrets.OM_SERVICE_NAME }}
          schema_path: './models'

That's it. Open a PR and watch it work. 🎉

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File Format Examples

dbt YAML (models/orders.yml)

version: 2
models:
  - name: orders
    description: "All customer orders"
    meta:
      owner: "data-team@company.com"
    tags: [finance, core]
    columns:
      - name: customer_id
        description: "Customer identifier"
        tags: [PII]

SQL (schema/orders.sql)

-- description: All customer orders
-- owner: data-team@company.com
-- tags: finance, core
CREATE TABLE orders (
    order_id    INT  NOT NULL,   -- PK: Primary key
    customer_id INT  NOT NULL    -- PII: Customer identifier
);

JSON Schema (schemas/orders.json)

{
  "title": "orders",
  "description": "All customer orders",
  "x-owner": "data-team@company.com",
  "x-tags": ["finance"],
  "properties": {
    "customer_id": {
      "type": "integer",
      "description": "Customer identifier",
      "x-tags": ["PII"]
    }
  }
}

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Inputs

Input	Required	Default	Description
openmetadata_host	✅	—	OpenMetadata instance URL
openmetadata_token	✅	—	JWT API token
github_token	✅	—	Use secrets.GITHUB_TOKEN
database_service_name	✅	—	Service name in OpenMetadata
schema_path	❌	.	Path to schema files
post_pr_comment	❌	true	Post PR summary comment
dry_run	❌	false	Log changes without applying

Outputs

Output	Description
tables_updated	Number of tables updated
columns_updated	Number of columns updated
changes_detected	true if any changes were found

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Local Development & Testing

# Clone the repo
git clone https://github.com/your-username/openmetadata-sync-action
cd openmetadata-sync-action

# Install dependencies
pip install -r requirements.txt

# Run tests
pytest tests/ -v

# Test locally with dry run
export OM_HOST="http://localhost:8585"
export OM_TOKEN="your-token"
export DB_SERVICE_NAME="your-service"
export SCHEMA_PATH="./examples/dbt_project/models"
export DRY_RUN="true"
export GITHUB_WORKSPACE="."
python src/main.py

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Architecture

openmetadata-sync-action/
├── action.yml                    # GitHub Action definition
├── Dockerfile                    # Container for the action
├── requirements.txt
├── src/
│   ├── main.py                   # Entry point & orchestration
│   ├── file_detector.py          # Detect changed files via git diff
│   ├── openmetadata_client.py    # OpenMetadata REST API wrapper
│   ├── diff_detector.py          # Smart change detection
│   ├── pr_commenter.py           # GitHub PR comment poster
│   └── parsers/
│       ├── dbt_parser.py         # dbt YAML model parser
│       ├── sql_parser.py         # SQL CREATE TABLE parser
│       └── json_schema_parser.py # JSON Schema parser
├── tests/
│   └── test_parsers.py
└── examples/
    ├── dbt_project/models/schema.yml
    ├── sql_project/products.sql
    └── json_project/payments.json

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Setting Up OpenMetadata Locally

# Download the docker-compose file
curl -sL https://github.com/open-metadata/OpenMetadata/releases/download/1.6.0-release/docker-compose.yml -o docker-compose.yml

# Start OpenMetadata
docker compose up -d

# Access at http://localhost:8585
# Default credentials: admin / admin

Get your API token: Settings → Bots → ingestion-bot → Token

🎥 Demo Video

Watch the demo

🏆 Hackathon Track

Paradox #T-04 — Developer Tooling & CI/CD WeMakeDevs × OpenMetadata Hackathon 2026

🔗 Live Demo

• Action Repo: https://github.com/pardhan03/openmetadata-sync-action
• Demo Repo: https://github.com/pardhan03/openmetadata-demo

Built for the OpenMetadata Hackathon 🏆