Sometimes you can't finish your CI/CD job in a single run: you have to wait for some event or until an external long-running process finishes. In that case, you can schedule a delayed job to finish it later.

To make it work, you have to generate a new GitHub token with workflows and repo permissions because by default GitHub permits creating workflows by automation tools. Add new token to the secret with the WORKFLOWS_TOKEN name.

# ... your steps ...
# ...
# schedule the rest for finishing later:

- uses: cardinalby/schedule-job-action@v1
  with:
    ghToken: ${{ secrets.WORKFLOWS_TOKEN }}
    templateYmlFile: '.github-scheduled-workflows/example.yml'

Create .github-scheduled-workflows/example.yml scheduled workflow definition (using cron trigger) with the single job:

name: "example-cron-action"
on:
  schedule:
    - cron:  '*/15 * * * *'    # At every 15th minute

jobs:
  singleJobName:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    strategy:
      matrix:
        node-version: [12.x]
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v2
        with:
          ref: ${{ env.DELAYED_JOB_CHECKOUT_REF }} # SHA that triggered your original job 

      - name: Do some work
        run: echo $GITHUB_SHA

      # If job finished successfully, remove the workflow file (and tag if necessary)
      - name: Remove scheduled job
        uses: cardinalby/unschedule-job-action@v1
        with:
          ghToken: ${{ secrets.WORKFLOWS_TOKEN }} 

Please note, it's not located in the .github directory. It's just a template that will be copied to the .github directory during the run.

Also, the action will add several env variables to the env section of the template workflow file:

• DELAYED_JOB_CHECKOUT_REF
  SHA of a commit triggered the original workflow or tag name from the addTag input

• DELAYED_JOB_CHECKOUT_REF_IS_TAG
true (ref above is a tag name) or false (it's a commit SHA)

• DELAYED_JOB_WORKFLOW_FILE_PATH
.github/workflows/example-%SHA%.yml in our example (see targetYmlFileName input).

• DELAYED_JOB_WORKFLOW_UNSCHEDULE_TARGET_BRANCH
master (see targetBranch input)

• DELAYED_JOB_PAYLOAD
  If jobPayload input was filled.

Step with cardinalby/unschedule-job-action action utilizes these env variables for proper removing of the delayed workflow file and tag.

To limit failed attempts number for the delayed job to run, add cardinalby/unschedule-job-action as a first step in .github-scheduled-workflows/example.yml (before checkout) with the condition:

- name: Remove scheduled job after 10 attempts
  uses: cardinalby/unschedule-job-action@v1
  if: github.run_number > 10
  with:
    ghToken: ${{ secrets.WORKFLOWS_TOKEN }} 

Remember, scheduled workflows can run only in the main branch (master) of the repository.

The action checks if a commit triggered the run was made by the action itself (adding scheduled workflow file) or by other action (deleting scheduled workflow file) to prevent an infinite loop caused by actions.

• ghToken Required
  Special GitHub access token with workflows permission. Use secrets!

• templateYmlFile Required
  Path (relative to the repository) to template scheduled workflow yml file.

• overrideTargetFile Default: true
  Override yml file if exists. If false and file exists, action will fail.

• targetYmlFileName Default: templateYmlFile's name + sha/tag + .yml
  Target yml file name in .github/workflows folder

• targetRepo Default: current repository
  Repository to add the delayed workflow to. Format: owner-name/repo-name

• targetBranch Default: master
  Branch to push. Please note, scheduled jobs work only in the default branch.

• addTag
  Specify a tag to schedule job for. Will be used as a ref in the checkout step instead of commit sha.

• jobPayload
  Optional, pass a string to DELAYED_JOB_PAYLOAD env variable in delayed workflow file.

• targetYmlFileName File name of the new yml file (inside .github/workflows folder).
• targetYmlFilePath Absolute path to the target yml file.