Support for starting job service on condition is met

[igagis]

Describe the enhancement Add support of if: property to jobs.<job-id>.services.<service-id> to start services only in case a condition is met.

Code Snippet

jobs:
  my_job:
    services:
      my_service:
        if: ${{ some expression }}
        ....

[tanguyantoine]

That would be very helpful if you have a shared workflow. We could turn on/off services based on workflow inputs

[imclem]

Couldn't agree more, we add steps to run docker run manually because we don't have conditions on services.

[thobianchi]

leaving service.<service-name>.image empty does not start the service, this is the output:

The service 'postgres' will not be started because the container definition has an empty image.

This can be used to build a basic conditional, it is a workaround, a proper solution should be implemented.

[bvtk]

Yes this would be a cool feature, we have the same problem on a shared workflow

[vyacheslav-korneev]

Got here searching for the solution of our problem with shared workflows :) Hope this feature will be implemented as it would increase the utility of shared workflows dramatically.

[flozano]

this would be very useful when reusing workflows, please consider implementing it

[ChristopherHX]

I think the following is supported, since https://github.com/actions/runner/commit/3e196355deb87ff9f4c0c0b4643f512e62257bf8 aka v2.299.0 or later

jobs:
  my_job:
    services:
      my_service:
        image: ${{ (some expression) && 'image:tag' || '' }}

It's very similar to an if, just not so nice to write.

[flozano]

thanks a lot, I was trying something similar. not nice aesthetically but if it works it's great.

[cezar-tech]

That would be very helpful for my organization as well

[keramblock]

Almost 3 years passed

[sergbar]

I think the following is supported, since 3e19635 aka v2.299.0 or later

jobs:
  my_job:
    services:
      my_service:
        image: ${{ (some expression) && 'image:tag' || '' }}

It's very similar to an if, just not so nice to write.

In my example it works as designed. If database_name input not provided (is empty) skip the installation and if it's provided then use postgres image with the version as provided in the postgres_version input.

    services:
      postgres:
        image: ${{ ( inputs.database_name != '' ) && format('postgres:{0}', inputs.postgres_version) || '' }}

[Cyberboss]

Workaround works perfectly for me

[Cyberboss]

Best GH can do is update the docs with this workaround.

[knu]

The workaround is not ideal as the image names specified in expressions will fall off from automated updates via Renovate.