[FEATURE REQUEST] Send multiple events at once

[Badisi]

Thanks for this GH action !

I was wondering if it would be possible to send multiple events at once ?

I'm currently reusing too many workflows and hitting the error "too many workflows are referenced, total: 22, limit: 20".
See the documentation.
So it would be great to only use your job once and send all my events, instead of having to use a job per event.

[gnpaone]

Yeah, I need this too. I can work on this issue if it's fine

[peter-evans]

Please could you explain your problem in more detail, preferably with examples. My current recommendation is to use a matrix, as described in the readme. Could you explain why that doesn't work for your use case(s).

[gnpaone]

For example if we use the matrix, the same workflow runs twice (duplicate run for other steps) instead dispatch I want to dispatch to multiple repos or multiple events in single step

Example:

- name: Repo dispatch
  uses: peter-evans/repository-dispatch@v3
  with:
    event-type: ${{ matrix.events }}

PS: well to avoid this I can run repo dispatch in separate jobs as a workaround but still for cases in same job

[Badisi]

My personal use case is to dispatch multiple events in a row, not to dispatch an event to multiple repos.

The goal is to use your workflow once instead of N times, and do not break the total limit.

Example

Do this:

jobs:
    ci_tests:
        runs-on: 'ubuntu-latest'
        steps:
            - name: Test component A, B, C
              uses: peter-evans/repository-dispatch@v3
              with:
                  event-types: [test_compA, test_compB, test_compC]

instead of this:

jobs:
    ci_tests:
        runs-on: 'ubuntu-latest'
        steps:
            - name: Test component A
              uses: peter-evans/repository-dispatch@v3
              with:
                  event-type: test_compA

            - name: Test component B
              uses: peter-evans/repository-dispatch@v3
              with:
                  event-type: test_compB

            - name: Test component C
              uses: peter-evans/repository-dispatch@v3
              with:
                  event-type: test_compC

[gnpaone]

@Badisi Exactly the same use case for me too. By using matrix it's same as

jobs:
    ci_tests:
        runs-on: 'ubuntu-latest'
        steps:
            - name: Test component A
              uses: peter-evans/repository-dispatch@v3
              with:
                  event-type: test_compA

            - name: Test component B
              uses: peter-evans/repository-dispatch@v3
              with:
                  event-type: test_compB

            - name: Test component C
              uses: peter-evans/repository-dispatch@v3
              with:
                  event-type: test_compC

[gnpaone]

Or it can be

jobs:
    ci_tests:
        runs-on: 'ubuntu-latest'
        steps:
            - name: Test component A, B, C
              uses: peter-evans/repository-dispatch@v3
              with:
                  event-types: test_compA, test_compB, test_compC

[peter-evans]

I'm still not sure why this cannot be done with a matrix. The matrix can just have an array of event types.

Additionally, I'm not sure that the limitation you referenced in the docs applies to repository_dispatch. My understanding is that the limit only applies when you are using reusable workflows. That's a different feature to repository_dispatch. Have you got reusable workflows somewhere in your workflow pipeline?

[gnpaone]

I'm not sure about limitations part as it's a concern for @Badisi

My current workflow https://github.com/gnpaone/rust-just/blob/44c420b2919a720127a5f2ba199d9cc5f8a2f7af/.github/workflows/trigger-release.yml#L62

Currently, I use matrix.events for multiple events dispatch. This step is in separate job. But if I have to include this repository dispatch step in release job along with matrix.events and let's say matrix.events contains 2 events then Copy Release step will also run two times which is not good