codeql-action/init workflow validation doesn't respect custom source-root

Open
#3,142 1 comment 0 reactions 0 assignees View on GitHub

Nobody has claimed this yet.

Assessment

Difficulty
3/5
Estimated time
1-2 days
Newbie friendliness
48/100
Issue type
Bug
Clarity
Mostly clear
Activity status
Stale
Tech stack
github-actions, typescript
Domain
ci-cd, security

Research direction

Start at src/workflow.ts lines 285-290, which the issue identifies as the likely source of the warning. Reproduce the validation with actions/checkout using path "my-custom-path" and init using source-root "my-custom-path". Done means the custom CodeQL workflow is found without the reported warning.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Description

We get the warning

Warning: Unable to validate code scanning workflow: error: getWorkflow() failed: Error: Expected to find a code scanning workflow file at /home/runner/_work/ProDriver-Safety-Path/ProDriver-Safety-Path/.github/workflows/nightly_codeql.yml, but no such file existed. This can happen if the currently running workflow checks out a branch that doesn't contain the corresponding workflow file.

in our custom CodeQL workflow. We check out our repository in a custom location and specify this location using source-root:

  - name: Checkout
    uses: actions/checkout@v4
    if: always()
    with:
        path: "my-custom-path"

  - name: Initialize CodeQL
    uses: github/codeql-action/init@v3
    with:
        languages: ${{ matrix.language }}
        build-mode: ${{ matrix.build-mode }}
        source-root: "my-custom-path"

It looks like the bug is this code: https://github.com/github/codeql-action/blob/c6e30a2b5a6e3c0a72eb142ec994f99816593c51/src/workflow.ts#L285-L290

Dominant language
TypeScript
Stars
1.6k
Forks
493
Avg merge
1d 13h
Merged PRs (30d)
44

Contributor guide

Open the contributing guide

First steps

  1. Read the whole issue, then the project's contributing guide.
  2. Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
  3. Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
  4. Open a pull request that references the issue number.

More from github/codeql-action

All issues in github/codeql-action

Similar issues

More TypeScript issues

Get new issues in your inbox

A short digest of beginner-friendly GitHub issues.