CI runs on pull_request, not on feature-branch pushes#

Context#

After pushing a feature branch, the post-push CI monitor searched for workflow runs on the pushed commit and found zero. The instinct is to suspect a broken push, a misconfigured workflow, or a queuing delay. None of those was true — the workflows are simply not configured to run on a branch push. Remote CI only started once a pull request was opened.

Guidance#

opnDossier's CI is gated on pull_request and push to main. A push to a feature branch with no open PR triggers nothing. To exercise remote CI on a branch, open a PR — that fires ci.yml and security.yml against the head commit.

The local just ci-check recipe is the pre-push gate; remote CI is a PR-time gate. Running just ci-check locally before pushing is what validates a branch commit — not a remote run, because there is no remote run until the PR exists.

Trigger map for the workflows in .github/workflows/ (as of this writing):

Practical consequence: on a feature branch, only a PR (or merging to main) runs Actions. Doc/metadata-only branches still get the full ci.yml + security.yml matrix once a PR is open, because neither has a path filter.

Why This Matters#

• The github-action-monitor skill returning "0 runs for this commit" on a branch push is expected, not a failure. Reporting it as a CI failure would be wrong; reporting it as "CI passed" would be equally wrong — nothing ran.
• It prevents wasted debugging: the absence of runs is a trigger-config fact, not a symptom of a bad push, auth problem, or Actions outage.
• It reinforces the project rule that just ci-check must pass locally before pushing — it is the real gate for branch commits, and there is no remote substitute until PR time. (See AGENTS.md § "Run just ci-check BEFORE committing".)

When to Apply#

• Immediately after git push of a feature branch, before concluding anything about CI health.
• When the CI monitor reports no runs — check whether a PR exists before investigating the push.
• When deciding whether to open a PR: opening one is the action that starts remote CI, so open it (or keep the branch local) deliberately rather than waiting for runs that will never appear.

Examples#

Finding zero runs on a fresh branch push is the normal state:

# After: git push -u origin chore/my-branch (no PR yet)
COMMIT=$(git rev-parse HEAD)
gh run list --branch chore/my-branch --limit 10 \
  --json headSha,name,status \
  --jq "[.[] | select(.headSha==\"$COMMIT\")] | length"
# => 0 ← expected; no PR means no pull_request trigger, and the
# push trigger only fires on main

Opening the PR is what starts CI:

gh pr create --base main --head chore/my-branch --title "..." --body-file body.md
# Now ci.yml + security.yml queue against the head commit:
gh run list --branch chore/my-branch --limit 10 \
  --json name,status,event \
  --jq '[.[] | select(.event=="pull_request") | {name,status}]'
# => CI: in_progress, Security: in_progress