Use working-directory for entire job

[dakom]

Is it possible to specify a working-directory for an entire job? e.g. the equivilent of specifying the same one on every step?

[Yanjingzhu]

When you use jobs.<job_id>.steps.run , using the working-directory keyword, you can specify the working directory of where to run the command. You need to add work-directory keyword to all jobs.<job_id>.steps.run.

Please refer to this document for more details.

https://help.github.com/en/actions/automating-your-workflow-with-github-actions/workflow-syntax-for-github-actions#jobsjob_idstepsrun

If you want to use working-directory for entire job, I would suggest to set a job level environment variable, set its value with the directory, and then use context with ${{ env.variablename}} as the value of work-directory keyword in jobs.<job_id>.steps.run.  

For Contexts syntax for GitHub Actions , please refer to:

https://help.github.com/en/actions/automating-your-workflow-with-github-actions/contexts-and-expression-syntax-for-github-actions#contexts

Please see my example, my repo file structure is like this:

repo dir.png1022×262 18.7 KB

I add a job level env named “working-directory”. Then set ${{env.working-directory}} as the value of working-directory keyword in jobs.<job_id>.steps.run.  

 

[seiwonpark]

@seiwonpark The same applies with your code.

Oh you meant like permanent checkout not putting the command to all steps.

[Adamou02]

@dnut Do you have a solution for "uses" command ?

[james-wangx]

You should look uses docs.
For example, in "uses" setup-node. We should use cache-dependency-path to specify the path to a dependency file:

steps:
- uses: actions/checkout@v4
- uses: actions/setup-node@v4
  with:
    node-version: 16
    cache: 'npm'
    cache-dependency-path: subdir/package-lock.json
- run: npm ci
- run: npm test

[kubukoz]

This is an "answer"? It's a workaround :/

[will-molloy]

Adding to that, you can use defaults to set a default working-directory instead of changing it everywhere:

Why is the correct answer hidden, lol

[bukowa]

Its a workaround, but a lot of reptition code and not error prone!

[MatteoGioioso]

Yes this is not a great solution since you cannot use

uses

with 

working-directory

[nodesocket]

Is there still no way to set a working directory that applies to all the steps in a job?

[Yanjingzhu]

@nodesocket I am afraid that I have to say no. What’s your scenario which need to run all steps in a specific path? Let me see whether there’s a work around for you. 

[xsaamiir]

Hey @yanjingzhu ,

In my case I am using GitHub Actions in a monorepo and I would love to be able the set the working directory on the job level for all steps since I tend to only run a job for a specific sub directory / repo.

[ktulark]

Hello, You can use this

jobs:
  build:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    defaults:
      run:
        working-directory: shared-models

[nnnik]

As established doesn't work for step with uses (aka Actions) therefore a hackfix at best.

[Yanjingzhu]

Hi @sharkyze , 

For job level working-directory , I would recommand you to share your scenario and requirement in the Feedback form for GitHub Actions. Thank you for your understanding. 

[Masahigo]

 @nodesocket  Doesn’t this get it done: https://help.github.com/en/actions/reference/workflow-syntax-for-github-actions#jobsjob_iddefaultsrun

[nodesocket]

@masahigo that worked perfectly. Must have missed that.

defaults:  
  run:  
    working-directory: ./foo  

[fullkomnun]

Take a look at: https://dev.to/shofol/run-your-github-actions-jobs-from-a-specific-directory-1i9e

[tshakah]

https://dev.to/shofol/run-your-github-actions-jobs-from-a-specific-directory-1i9e

[kazuooooo]

defaults:
  run:
    working-directory: ./your_working_dir
jobs:
  ...

works for me.

[janosh]

Note that this applies only to steps of type run , not all steps. If you have a step like

- name: Set up node
  uses: actions/setup-node@v3
  with:
    cache-dependency-path: <some-npm/yarn/pnpm-lock-file>

the cache-dependency-path is still relative to repo root, not working-directory.

[davidcorbin-atmosera]

Consider a trivial case. One Repo has multiple projects each in their own sub-folder. The commands require that the project folder be the current folder… Now create workflow/actions so that everything happens for a given project.

[enthal]

That’s for all jobs, not all tasks in a given job.

[james-green-affinity]

Have you found a way to use

uses

with

working-directory

?

[roberthstrand]

You can set working directory as a default for all jobs, default for all steps in a job, or on a per job basis. See the third example here. Does this help you, or did I misunderstand what you are trying to do?

[uuf6429]

If you read the previous messages, the working-directory setting only applies to run... actions will still be applied to the workspace directory.

You can infer this by the fact that it is under 'run':

jobs:
  job1:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    defaults:
      run:     <--------
        working-directory: scripts

see also: https://github.com/orgs/community/discussions/25742#discussioncomment-4186461

[itspngu]

jobs:
  job1:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    defaults:
      run:
        working-directory: scripts

  <a href="https://docs.github.com/en/actions/learn-github-actions/workflow-syntax-for-github-actions#jobsjob_iddefaults" target="_blank" rel="noopener nofollow ugc">GitHub Docs</a>

Workflow syntax for GitHub Actions - GitHub Docs

A workflow is a configurable automated process made up of one or more jobs. You must create a YAML file to define your workflow configuration.

[ornakash]

It doesn't work for "uses" steps

[KyleKing]

I wish there was a working-dir: inherit! Something like:

name: wd-inherit

on:
  pull_request:

jobs:
  defaults:
    run:
      working-directory: ./proj1
  job1:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
    - uses: actions/checkout@v3
    - uses: actions/setup-python@v3
      working-dir: inherit

[Jean1dev]

[skeet70]

I've upvoted things here to try to increase visibility, but I'd like to elaborate our use case just in case that helps the github team. Similarly to others, we have a monorepo workflows containing all the re-usable internal workflows our organization consumes (things like rust-ci, scala-ci, deploy-docker, etc) that our other repos point to and make use of. They pass inputs to tweak the behaviour of the workflow they're using.

To increase org wide stability of CI we want to test those workflows inside the workflows monorepo, so if your change to a re-usable workflow is going to break downstream users you find out about it right away on your PR instead of over the next week as CI starts failing across many repos. To accomplish that we've added simple projects to the workflows monorepo that reproduce downstream language projects and can exercise the build+test+deploy functionality of the reusable workflows. Each of those projects needs to be in a subfolder though so the re-usable workflow needs to be passed a top level working directory for all its commands to happen in the context of, and some of those re-usable workflows make use of other actions (so defaults: run: working-directory) doesn't cover everything.

[ashishjullia]

Any solution for this in 2024?

[jsh95311]

Any solution for this in 2025?

[Adamou02]

Any solution for this in 2026 😂?