Fix for issue 2232: Many lines of "Could not find any stages to run" on run

[Andy4495]

Fixes #2232: Many lines of "Could not find any stages to run" on run
Fixes #1993: Unexpected failure due to warning "Could not find any stages to run"

Issues #2232 and #1993 were introduced with pull request #1970.

The Problem

#1970 prints a lot of messages even when there isn’t a problem, since the check is called twice for each workflow file in the workflows directory:

WARN[0000] Could not find any stages to run. View the valid jobs with `act --list`. Use `act --help` to find how to filter by Job ID/Workflow/Event Name

In addition, it prints an error message at the end of the run, even if the job was run successfully:

Error: Could not find any stages to run. View the valid jobs with `act --list`. Use `act --help` to find how to filter by Job ID/Workflow/Event Name

This also has the side effect of causing act to return an error code (1), even if the run was successful:

> act -j the-test
INFO[0000] Using docker host 'unix:///var/run/docker.sock', and daemon socket 'unix:///var/run/docker.sock' 
WARN[0000] Could not find any stages to run. View the valid jobs with `act --list`. Use `act --help` to find how to filter by Job ID/Workflow/Event Name 
WARN[0000] Could not find any stages to run. View the valid jobs with `act --list`. Use `act --help` to find how to filter by Job ID/Workflow/Event Name 
WARN[0000] Could not find any stages to run. View the valid jobs with `act --list`. Use `act --help` to find how to filter by Job ID/Workflow/Event Name 
WARN[0000] Could not find any stages to run. View the valid jobs with `act --list`. Use `act --help` to find how to filter by Job ID/Workflow/Event Name 
WARN[0000] Could not find any stages to run. View the valid jobs with `act --list`. Use `act --help` to find how to filter by Job ID/Workflow/Event Name 
WARN[0000] Could not find any stages to run. View the valid jobs with `act --list`. Use `act --help` to find how to filter by Job ID/Workflow/Event Name 
WARN[0000] Could not find any stages to run. View the valid jobs with `act --list`. Use `act --help` to find how to filter by Job ID/Workflow/Event Name 
WARN[0000] Could not find any stages to run. View the valid jobs with `act --list`. Use `act --help` to find how to filter by Job ID/Workflow/Event Name 
. . . job run output deleted for brevity . . . 
[Test-Workflow/the-test] 🏁  Job succeeded
Error: Could not find any stages to run. View the valid jobs with `act --list`. Use `act --help` to find how to filter by Job ID/Workflow/Event Name
[1] > echo $?                                                                                                 
1

The Fix

This pull request fixes these issues by making the following changes:

1. Revert the changes made by pull request fix: fail if no stages were found #1970
2. Add the "no stages to run" check and error message to the file root.go

This solves both problems mentioned above:

1. The error message is only printed once, and only if there truly are no stages/jobs to run.
2. act returns success (0) if the run was successful, and failure (1) if there were no stages to run

With this fix, the output is as follows. Note the error code returned in both cases:

Normal run, including return code of 0:

> act-test -j the-test
INFO[0000] Using docker host 'unix:///var/run/docker.sock', and daemon socket 'unix:///var/run/docker.sock' 
[Test-Workflow/the-test] 🚀  Start image=ghcr.io/catthehacker/ubuntu:act-latest
[Test-Workflow/the-test]   🐳  docker pull image=ghcr.io/catthehacker/ubuntu:act-latest platform= username= forcePull=true
[Test-Workflow/the-test]   🐳  docker create image=ghcr.io/catthehacker/ubuntu:act-latest platform= entrypoint=["tail" "-f" "/dev/null"] cmd=[] network="host"
[Test-Workflow/the-test]   🐳  docker run image=ghcr.io/catthehacker/ubuntu:act-latest platform= entrypoint=["tail" "-f" "/dev/null"] cmd=[] network="host"
[Test-Workflow/the-test] ⭐ Run Main actions/checkout@v4
[Test-Workflow/the-test]   🐳  docker cp src=/Users/test/Documents/act-error-test/act/. dst=/Users/test/Documents/act-error-test/act
[Test-Workflow/the-test]   ✅  Success - Main actions/checkout@v4
[Test-Workflow/the-test] ⭐ Run Main echo "Test-workflow run."
[Test-Workflow/the-test]   🐳  docker exec cmd=[bash --noprofile --norc -e -o pipefail /var/run/act/workflow/1] user= workdir=
| Test-workflow run.
[Test-Workflow/the-test]   ✅  Success - Main echo "Test-workflow run."
[Test-Workflow/the-test] Cleaning up container for job the-test
[Test-Workflow/the-test] 🏁  Job succeeded
> echo $?
0

Failed run because no valid jobs were found, including return code of 1:

> act-test -j gibberish                                                                                                                        ~/Documents/act-error-test/act
INFO[0000] Using docker host 'unix:///var/run/docker.sock', and daemon socket 'unix:///var/run/docker.sock' 
Error: Could not find any stages to run. View the valid jobs with `act --list`. Use `act --help` to find how to filter by Job ID/Workflow/Event Name
[1] > echo $?
1

[mergify]

@Andy4495 this pull request has failed checks 🛠

[Andy4495]

This also fixes #1993, which is the same issue as #2232.

For reference, the issue was introduced in act version v0.2.50

[codecov]

Codecov Report

All modified and coverable lines are covered by tests ✅

Project coverage is 76.49%. Comparing base (5a80a04) to head (a02f1f7).
Report is 67 commits behind head on master.

Additional details and impacted files

@@             Coverage Diff             @@
##           master    #2272       +/-   ##
===========================================
+ Coverage   61.56%   76.49%   +14.92%     
===========================================
  Files          53       59        +6     
  Lines        9002     7504     -1498     
===========================================
+ Hits         5542     5740      +198     
+ Misses       3020     1241     -1779     
- Partials      440      523       +83     

☔ View full report in Codecov by Sentry.
📢 Have feedback on the report? Share it here.

[mergify]

@Andy4495 this pull request has failed checks 🛠

[mergify]

@Andy4495 this pull request has failed checks 🛠

[mergify]

@Andy4495 this pull request has failed checks 🛠

[mergify]

@Andy4495 this pull request has failed checks 🛠

[Andy4495]

After investigating the failed test cases in the codecov report, I realized that the following check in createStages() is never true:

	if len(stages) == 0 && err != nil {
 		return nil, err
 	}

since err is always nil (it is never given a value after it is declared).

This check was added as part of pull request #1619 (issue #1595), released in version 0.2.43.

I therefore removed the check and updated the test case.

[jedahan]

So is it currently safe to ignore these warnings? Just want to make sure I am using act correctly.

[Andy4495]

So is it currently safe to ignore these warnings? Just want to make sure I am using act correctly.

Yes, the currently released code has the check in the wrong place, so the "Could not find any stages to run" warning is displayed even when there are jobs to run.