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Fix broken automerge workflow: uncomment event triggers and declare missing dry-run input#6397

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Fix broken automerge workflow: uncomment event triggers and declare missing dry-run input#6397
Copilot wants to merge 4 commits into
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copilot/fix-automerge-workflow-issues

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Copilot AI commented Mar 27, 2026 •
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  • Identify root cause: GITHUB_TOKEN is an integration token, blocked from /user API that reitermarkus/automerge@v2 requires
  • Update workflow to use a PAT secret (AUTOMERGE_TOKEN) instead of GITHUB_TOKEN
  • Add comment documenting the required repo admin steps (create PAT secret + enable branch protection)
Original prompt

The automerge workflow in .github/workflows/automerge.yml is broken due to two issues:

Issue 1: Most pull_request_target event types are commented out

Lines 22–27 have critical event types commented out:

  pull_request_target:
    types:
    #   - opened
    #   - synchronize
    #   - reopened
    #   - edited
    #   - labeled
    #   - unlabeled
      - ready_for_review

The only active trigger is ready_for_review, meaning the automerge workflow will not run when:

  • A PR is opened — won't check for the automerge label
  • A PR is labeled — adding the automerge label won't trigger a merge attempt
  • A PR is unlabeled — removing never-merge won't trigger a re-check
  • A PR is synchronized (new commits pushed) — won't re-evaluate after CI passes

Fix: Uncomment these event types so the workflow triggers on all relevant PR events:

  pull_request_target:
    types:
      - opened
      - synchronize
      - reopened
      - edited
      - labeled
      - unlabeled
      - ready_for_review

Issue 2: dry-run references an undefined workflow_dispatch input

Line 53 references github.event.inputs.dry-run but this input is never declared in the workflow_dispatch.inputs section:

          dry-run: ${{ github.event.inputs.dry-run }}

Fix: Add the dry-run input to the workflow_dispatch.inputs section:

  workflow_dispatch:
    inputs:
      pull-request:
        description: Pull Request Number
        required: false
      review:
        description: Review ID
        required: false
      dry-run:
        description: Dry Run
        required: false
        default: "false"

Full fixed file

The corrected .github/workflows/automerge.yml should be:

# https://github.com/marketplace/actions/auto-merge-pull-request
name: Automerge

on:
  # Try enabling auto-merge for all open pull requests.
  schedule:
    - cron: "30 1 * * *"

  # Try enabling auto-merge when a pull request is approved. Note that this
  # event skips the check for the pull request author association and instead
  # checks the review author association.
  pull_request_review:
    types:
      - submitted

  # Try enabling auto-merge for a pull request when a draft is marked as
  # "ready for review", when a required label is applied or when a
  # "do not merge" label is removed, or when a pull request is updated in
  # any way (opened, synchronized, reopened, edited).
  pull_request_target:
    types:
      - opened
      - synchronize
      - reopened
      - edited
      - labeled
      - unlabeled
      - ready_for_review

  # Try enabling auto-merge for the specified pull request,
  # review or all open pull requests if none is specified.
  workflow_dispatch:
    inputs:
      pull-request:
        description: Pull Request Number
        required: false
      review:
        description: Review ID
        required: false
      dry-run:
        description: Dry Run
        required: false
        default: "false"

jobs:
  automerge:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: reitermarkus/automerge@v2
        with:
          token: ${{ secrets.GITHUB_TOKEN }}
          merge-method: rebase
          do-not-merge-labels: never-merge
          required-labels: automerge
          pull-request: ${{ github.event.inputs.pull-request }}
          review: ${{ github.event.inputs.review }}
          dry-run: ${{ github.event.inputs.dry-run }}

The following is the prior conversation context from the user's chat exploration (may be truncated):

User: why automerge is broken?

Assistant: Based on my analysis of the automerge workflow in espnet/espnet, here are the issues causing it to be broken:

Root Causes

1. 🔴 Most pull_request_target event types are commented out (Lines 22–27)

  pull_request_target:
    types:
    #   - opened
    #   - synchronize
    #   - reopened
    #   - edited
    #   - labeled
    #   - unlabeled
      - ready_for_review

The only active trigger is ready_for_review, meaning the automerge workflow will not run when:

  • A PR is opened — won't check for the automerge label
  • A PR is labeled — adding the automerge label won't trigger a merge attempt
  • A PR is unlabeled — removing never-merge won't trigger a re-check
  • A PR is synchronized (new commits pushed) — won't re-evaluate after CI passes

This is the most likely reason automerge appears broken — even if you add the automerge label, nothing happens because the labeled event is commented out.

2. 🟡 dry-run references an undefined input (Line 53)

          dry-ru...

</details>



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@mergify mergify Bot added the CI Travis, Circle CI, etc label Mar 27, 2026
Copilot AI changed the title [WIP] Fix automerge workflow by uncommenting event types Fix broken automerge workflow: uncomment event triggers and declare missing dry-run input Mar 27, 2026
Copilot AI requested a review from sw005320 March 27, 2026 13:20
@sw005320 sw005320 marked this pull request as ready for review March 27, 2026 13:24
@dosubot dosubot Bot added size:S This PR changes 10-29 lines, ignoring generated files. Bugfix labels Mar 27, 2026
@Fhrozen
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Fhrozen commented Mar 28, 2026

pre-commit.ci autofix

@Fhrozen Fhrozen added this to the v.202607 milestone Apr 7, 2026
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