New Job Type "No-Op" Job Can Make Complex Workflows Simple

There is a new “no-op” type of job available to customers, which does nothing. This is useful in some cases to shape complex workflows and simplify dependency relationships when there are large fan-in/fan-out scenarios.

Use “type: no-op” when defining a job at it does nothing.

some-job:
  type: no-op

For example, if you had a workflow for building and deploying a binary to several distribution channels you might have a configuration like this:

workflows:
  main:
    jobs:
      - build-binary
      - generate-docs
      - run-tests
      - publish-to-app-store:
          requires:
            - build-binary
            - generate-docs
            - run-tests
      - publish-to-play-store:
          requires:
            - build-binary
            - generate-docs
            - run-tests
      - publish-to-website:
          requires:
            - build-binary
            - generate-docs
            - run-tests

With the addition of a no-op job called “build” you could shape your workflow as follows:

workflows:
  main:
    jobs:
      - build-binary
      - generate-docs
      - run-tests
      - build:
          requires:
            - build-binary
            - generate-docs
            - run-tests
      - publish-to-app-store:
          requires:
            - build
      - publish-to-play-store:
          requires:
            - build
      - publish-to-website:
          requires:
            - build

This reduces duplication of requires stanzas and makes it easier to create new jobs both before and after “build” without making mistakes in the dependency relationships.