🧹 Purge workflow runs action

This GH action removes action runs from a repository. By default, obsolete workflow runs are deleted. Additional filter can be applied to deleted workflow runs by status/conclusion - see input parameters below for details.

Inputs

Name	Description	Default	Is optional
token	The token used to authenticate	${{ github.token }}	true
remove-obsolete	Remove obsolete workflows	true	true
remove-cancelled	Remove cancelled workflows	false	true
remove-failed	Remove failed workflows	false	true
remove-older-than	Remove workflows older than timeframe	<null>	true
remove-skipped	Remove skipped workflows	false	true

Warning

In the next major version the default of remove-obsolete will change from true to false!

Remarks on the input fields

All inputs are optional - if any input is not given, the default value will be used.

token

• Using github.token usually works, unless the actions are not scoped with repo rights. For more details, see the GITHUB_TOKEN.
• If the workflow has issues, you may need to use a personal access token (PAT) that must have the repo scope. More details, see "Creating a personal access token".

remove-obsolete

• All workflows that don't have a matching definition anymore will be deleted

remove-cancelled

• Remove workflows from the list that have been cancelled earlier
• Accepts either a boolean or a multiline string. Each line will be matched against the workflow's name. On match the run will be removed.

remove-failed

• Remove workflows from the list that have failed earlier
• Accepts either a boolean or a multiline string. Each line will be matched against the workflow's name. On match the run will be removed.

remove-older-than

• Remove workflows from the list that are older than the given timeframe (e.g. '10s', '30m', '12h', '7d', '2w', '6y' or any combination of these).
• Accepts a (multiline) string in the format of NU [W] where N is a number, U is a time unit and optionally W is the workflow name. The following units are supported:
  • s for seconds
  • m for minutes
  • h for hours
  • d for days
  • w for weeks
  • y for years
• When given as a multiline string, each line will be parsed as a separate input
• When given with W = * or without a workflow name, all workflows will be checked
• When given with a workflow name, only the matching workflows will be checked

remove-skipped

• Remove workflows from the list that have been skipped earlier
• Accepts either a boolean or a multiline string. Each line will be matched against the workflow's name. On match the run will be removed.

Important

All given inputs are applied (i.e. combined with a logical OR).

Example usage

Remove failed workflows

name: Scheduled purge of failed workflow runs
on:
  schedule:
    - cron: '54 0 * * 0'
jobs:
  purge_obsolete_workflows:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: otto-de/purge-deprecated-workflow-runs@v2
        with:
          remove-obsolete: false
          remove-failed: true

Advanced usage

The example below will trigger a run of this workflow each time a deployment status changes. All runs until success will be skipped and then cleaned up in the success case:

name: Manage Deployments
on:
  deployment_status:

jobs:
  clean_unfinished_deployment_status_tasks:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    if: github.event.deployment_status.state == 'success'
    steps:
      - uses: otto-de/purge-deprecated-workflow-runs@v2
        with:
          # disable default-behaviour of deleting orphaned runs
          remove-obsolete: false
          # remove previously cancelled runs of *all* workflows
          remove-cancelled: true
          # remove failed runs of *this* workflow
          remove-failed: |
            ${{ github.workflow }}
          # remove previously skipped runs of workflows with given names
          remove-skipped: |
            Unit Tests
            Deploy

The following example will remove all workflow runs that are older than 4 weeks and all runs of the current workflow older than 1 day:

name: Weekly purge of any workflow runs older than four weeks and current workflow runs older than one day
on:
  schedule:
    - cron: '0 0 * * 0'

jobs:
    purge_old_workflows:
        runs-on: ubuntu-latest
        steps:
        - uses: otto-de/purge-deprecated-workflow-runs@v2
          with:
            remove-older-than: |
              4w *
              1d ${{ github.workflow }}