From beed64aefda262572691e75a8236000d49456967 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: David Charlot <david@transaction.science>
Date: Fri, 9 Oct 2026 03:39:02 -0400
Subject: [PATCH] ci: does a skipped job report a commit status?

open-standards gates expensive path-filtered workflows behind a `relevant`
job, so dependent jobs skip when a change does not touch that standard. If a
skipped job reports no status, those contexts stay pending forever and a
branch rule requiring them can never be satisfied.

Four jobs, paired. gate-false -> dep-of-false should skip; gate-true ->
dep-of-true should run. The second pair is the control: if needs-outputs were
simply broken here and always read empty, every dependent would skip and the
result would look the same. dep-of-true running is what makes the skip mean
"the output said false". dep-literal isolates a self-skip with no needs edge,
and dep-matrix mirrors wai-pack's three-leg matrix to show whether each leg
reports its own context.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
---
 .forgejo/workflows/skip-status-probe.yml | 92 ++++++++++++++++++++++++
 1 file changed, 92 insertions(+)
 create mode 100644 .forgejo/workflows/skip-status-probe.yml

diff --git a/.forgejo/workflows/skip-status-probe.yml b/.forgejo/workflows/skip-status-probe.yml
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..d1b828e
--- /dev/null
+++ b/.forgejo/workflows/skip-status-probe.yml
@@ -0,0 +1,92 @@
+name: skip-status-probe
+
+# Does a SKIPPED job report a commit status on this forge?
+#
+# open-standards gates expensive path-filtered workflows behind a `relevant`
+# job: the dependent jobs carry `needs: relevant` + an `if:` on its output, so
+# they skip when the change does not touch that standard. If a skipped job
+# reports no status at all, every one of those contexts stays permanently
+# pending and a branch-protection rule that requires them can never be
+# satisfied — the PR becomes unmergeable. That is the question this answers,
+# before the pattern is rolled out past the one workflow that has it.
+#
+# Four jobs, and the pairing is the point:
+#   gate-false  -> dep-of-false   expected SKIP
+#   gate-true   -> dep-of-true    expected RUN
+# The second pair is the control. Without it, a skip proves nothing: if
+# `needs.*.outputs.*` were simply broken here and always read empty, EVERY
+# dependent would skip and the result would look identical. dep-of-true
+# running is what makes dep-of-false's skip mean "the output said false".
+#
+# dep-literal isolates a job skipped by its own `if: false`, with no `needs`
+# edge, to tell the two skip causes apart.
+#
+# dep-matrix mirrors the real shape under test: wai-pack's dependent jobs are
+# a three-platform matrix, so the required contexts are per-leg. Whether each
+# leg reports its own status, or the matrix collapses to one row, decides how
+# many contexts go missing.
+
+on:
+  push:
+    paths:
+      - ".forgejo/workflows/skip-status-probe.yml"
+  pull_request:
+    paths:
+      - ".forgejo/workflows/skip-status-probe.yml"
+
+concurrency:
+  group: skip-status-probe-${{ github.ref }}
+  cancel-in-progress: true
+
+jobs:
+  gate-false:
+    name: probe · gate emitting false
+    runs-on: linux
+    outputs:
+      touched: ${{ steps.decide.outputs.touched }}
+    steps:
+      - id: decide
+        run: echo "touched=false" >> "$GITHUB_OUTPUT"
+
+  gate-true:
+    name: probe · gate emitting true
+    runs-on: linux
+    outputs:
+      touched: ${{ steps.decide.outputs.touched }}
+    steps:
+      - id: decide
+        run: echo "touched=true" >> "$GITHUB_OUTPUT"
+
+  dep-of-false:
+    name: probe · dependent of a false gate (expect SKIP)
+    needs: gate-false
+    if: needs.gate-false.outputs.touched == 'true'
+    runs-on: linux
+    steps:
+      - run: echo "FAIL - this job should not have run"
+
+  dep-of-true:
+    name: probe · dependent of a true gate (expect RUN)
+    needs: gate-true
+    if: needs.gate-true.outputs.touched == 'true'
+    runs-on: linux
+    steps:
+      - run: echo "control - outputs propagate, so a skip above means false"
+
+  dep-literal:
+    name: probe · skipped by its own literal false (expect SKIP)
+    runs-on: linux
+    if: false
+    steps:
+      - run: echo "FAIL - this job should not have run"
+
+  dep-matrix:
+    name: probe · skipped matrix leg ${{ matrix.leg }} (expect SKIP)
+    needs: gate-false
+    if: needs.gate-false.outputs.touched == 'true'
+    runs-on: linux
+    strategy:
+      matrix:
+        leg: [alpha, beta, gamma]
+    steps:
+      - run: echo "FAIL - this job should not have run"
-- 
2.54.0 (Apple Git-157)