Act vs curl

act is an open-source command-line tool that runs GitHub Actions workflows locally using Docker containers. It reads workflow files from .github/workflows/ and executes them with environment variables and filesystem configurations matching GitHub's hosted runners. The tool enables fast local feedback on workflow changes without requiring commits and pushes to a remote repository.

curl is an open-source command-line tool and library for transferring data with URLs using various protocols including HTTP, HTTPS, FTP, and more. It's widely used for API testing and data transfer in scripts.