Script to format GitHub links

Almost all my code contributions go in various GitHub projects, either the original repositories or my forks.

Every time I use an URL to a GitHub issue or PR in Google Docs, Markdown or Asciidoc document, I update the link text to be more descriptive so instead of displaying the raw URL as https://github.com/wildfly/wildfly.org/pull/787, it is displayed as [wildfly/wildfly.org#787] Add Jeff Mesnil GPG Signing info.

I'm changing these links so often that I wrote a simple bash script to do it for me. The script can take an GitHub issue or PR argument and will output the corresponding text: [<org>/<repo>#<pr_or_issue>] <title>:

#!/bin/bash

# Get URL from argument or clipboard
if [ -n "$1" ]; then
    URL="$1"
elif command -v pbpaste &>/dev/null; then
    URL="$(pbpaste)"
else
    echo "No URL provided and pbpaste is not available."
    exit 1
fi

# Extract repo and number from GitHub issue or PR URL
if [[ "$URL" =~ github\.com/([^/]+/[^/]+)/(issues|pull)/([0-9]+) ]]; then
    REPO="${BASH_REMATCH[1]}"
    NUMBER="${BASH_REMATCH[3]}"
else
    echo "Invalid GitHub issue or pull request URL: $URL"
    exit 1
fi

# Fetch and parse the <title> content
HTML_TITLE=$(curl -s "$URL" | sed -n 's:.*<title>\(.*\)</title>.*:\1:p' | head -n1)

# Decode HTML entities
HTML_TITLE=$(echo "$HTML_TITLE" | sed -e "s/&#39;/'/g" -e 's/&quot;/\"/g' -e 's/&amp;/\&/g')

# Remove ' by AUTHOR' (before any dot)
HTML_TITLE=$(echo "$HTML_TITLE" | sed -E 's/ by [^·]+//')

# Remove everything after the first literal '·' (U+00B7), regardless of spacing
CLEAN_TITLE=$(echo "$HTML_TITLE" | sed 's/·.*//')

# Final formatted output
OUTPUT="[$REPO#$NUMBER] $CLEAN_TITLE"

# Copy to clipboard
if command -v pbcopy &>/dev/null; then
    echo "$OUTPUT" | pbcopy
else
    echo "Warning: Clipboard tool not found."
fi

# Output to terminal
echo "$OUTPUT"

afplay /System/Library/Sounds/Tink.aiff

To make it even simpler to use on my Mac, if there are no argument, it will instead use the content from the clipboard with pbpaste. It also copies the title to the clibpboard with pbcopy and play a sound when it is finished.

I saved this script as a "Format GitHub Link" shortcut with Apple Shortcuts to further streamline its use:

Now, When I want to add a GitHub link to a document, all I need to do is:

1. copy its link address (⌘ C)
2. paste it in my doc (⌘ V)
3. use the Spotligh launcher to run the script (⌘ <space bar> > "Format")
4. After I hear the sound, copy the formatted title from the clipboard (⌘ V)