From 9e24a71f45eb027228d3b55e141ed2102144c2bf Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Luther Monson <luther.monson@gmail.com>
Date: Thu, 21 May 2026 23:30:00 -0700
Subject: [PATCH] chore(ci): gate arm64/macOS matrix jobs on repo vars +
 continue-on-error
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Build (Linux arm64) and Build (macOS arm64) have been sitting in
"Pending" forever on every PR because no self-hosted runner with the
matching labels is online. That makes the PR checks UI look broken
and trains people to ignore yellow checks.

Two changes per gated job:

  if: ${{ vars.HAS_<ARCH>_RUNNER == 'true' }}
    Job is "Skipped" rather than "Pending" when the operator hasn't
    set the corresponding repo variable. To re-enable once a runner
    is online:
      gh variable set HAS_LINUX_ARM64_RUNNER --body true
      gh variable set HAS_MACOS_ARM64_RUNNER --body true

  continue-on-error: true
    Even when the runner IS online, a failure here doesn't fail the
    PR check group. These two platforms aren't covered by the
    primary CI runner so we tolerate flake there.

Windows amd64 stays required (no gate, no continue-on-error) — the
self-hosted Windows runner is live on the build machine and the
build sanity check is genuinely useful there.
---
 .github/workflows/ci.yml | 13 +++++++++++++
 1 file changed, 13 insertions(+)

diff --git a/.github/workflows/ci.yml b/.github/workflows/ci.yml
index 126a1d4..5b8c611 100644
--- a/.github/workflows/ci.yml
+++ b/.github/workflows/ci.yml
@@ -38,6 +38,14 @@ jobs:
   build-macos:
     name: Build (macOS arm64)
     needs: ci
+    # Gate on a repo variable so the job is "Skipped" (not "Pending forever")
+    # when no self-hosted macOS arm64 runner is online. Set
+    # `gh variable set HAS_MACOS_ARM64_RUNNER --body true` once the runner is up.
+    if: ${{ vars.HAS_MACOS_ARM64_RUNNER == 'true' }}
+    # Even when a runner is online, don't block PR merges on a Build (macOS arm64)
+    # failure — those failures are usually environmental (Apple notarisation
+    # quirks, codesign certs) rather than code regressions caught elsewhere.
+    continue-on-error: true
     runs-on: [self-hosted, macos, arm64]
     steps:
       - uses: actions/checkout@v6
@@ -60,6 +68,11 @@ jobs:
   build-linux-arm64:
     name: Build (Linux arm64)
     needs: ci
+    # Gate on a repo variable so the job is "Skipped" (not "Pending forever")
+    # when no self-hosted Linux arm64 runner is online. Set
+    # `gh variable set HAS_LINUX_ARM64_RUNNER --body true` once the runner is up.
+    if: ${{ vars.HAS_LINUX_ARM64_RUNNER == 'true' }}
+    continue-on-error: true
     runs-on: [self-hosted, linux, arm64]
     steps:
       - uses: actions/checkout@v6