Group actions on principal bundles and invariance conditions for gauge fields

Invariance conditions for gauge fields under smooth group actions are interpreted in terms of invariant connections on principal bundles. A classification of group actions on bundles as automorphisms projecting to an action on a base manifold with a sufficiently regular orbit structure is given in terms of group homorphisms and a generalization of Wang's theorem classifying invariant connections is derived. Illustrative examples on compactified Minkowski space are given.