Fix: wire `inputs.item_number` fallback for label trigger shorthand workflows by Copilot · Pull Request #19795 · github/gh-aw

Copilot · 2026-03-06T03:17:50Z

Label trigger shorthand (on: pull_request labeled my-label) auto-generates a workflow_dispatch with inputs.item_number, but the compiler never wired that input as a fallback for entity number expressions. Manual dispatch runs received empty PR/issue/discussion numbers in the prompt, and concurrent dispatches for different items could cancel each other via the same concurrency group.

Changes

compiler_orchestrator_workflow.go — Added extractDispatchItemNumber(frontmatter map[string]any) bool that detects the label-shorthand signature by walking the structured in-memory frontmatter map (on → workflow_dispatch → inputs → item_number) produced during preprocessing — no YAML string re-parsing. Called from extractYAMLSections to populate the new WorkflowData.HasDispatchItemNumber field.
compiler_types.go — Added HasDispatchItemNumber bool to WorkflowData as a typed, first-class field set at parse time.
expression_extraction.go — Added applyWorkflowDispatchFallbacks(mappings []*ExpressionMapping, hasItemNumber bool) which patches the three canonical entity number expressions:
```
github.event.pull_request.number → github.event.pull_request.number || inputs.item_number
github.event.issue.number        → github.event.issue.number        || inputs.item_number
github.event.discussion.number   → github.event.discussion.number   || inputs.item_number
```
The EnvVar name (e.g. GH_AW_GITHUB_EVENT_PULL_REQUEST_NUMBER) is preserved so existing env-var references remain stable.
compiler_yaml.go — Calls applyWorkflowDispatchFallbacks after all expression mappings (including inline-mode ones) have been collected, ensuring the fallback is applied consistently in both normal and inlined-imports modes.
concurrency.go — Added entityConcurrencyKey helper to eliminate duplicated key-building. buildConcurrencyGroupKeys reads workflowData.HasDispatchItemNumber and inserts inputs.item_number into the fallback chain for PR/issue/discussion workflows, e.g.:
```
${{ github.event.pull_request.number || inputs.item_number || github.ref || github.run_id }}
```
This prevents concurrent manual dispatches for different items from canceling each other.
Tests — Unit tests for extractDispatchItemNumber, applyWorkflowDispatchFallbacks, extractYAMLSections field population, and three new buildConcurrencyGroupKeys cases covering all three entity types with item_number. Parser integration tests in schedule_preprocessing_test.go verify the full pipeline from preprocessScheduleFields through extractDispatchItemNumber for all three entity types (pull_request, issues, discussion) and edge cases (comma-only labels error, 2-token fallthrough producing no item_number).

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…kflows Co-authored-by: pelikhan <4175913+pelikhan@users.noreply.github.com>

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Pull request overview

Fixes manual workflow_dispatch runs for label-trigger shorthand workflows by wiring inputs.item_number as a fallback for entity-number expressions and by ensuring concurrency groups differ per dispatched item.

Changes:

Add detection for workflow_dispatch + inputs.item_number and patch canonical entity-number expressions to fall back to inputs.item_number.
Update concurrency key generation to include inputs.item_number in the fallback chain to prevent cross-item cancellation.
Add unit tests covering the new detection, fallback application, and concurrency behavior.

Reviewed changes

Copilot reviewed 5 out of 5 changed files in this pull request and generated 3 comments.

Show a summary per file

File	Description
pkg/workflow/expression_extraction.go	Adds `hasWorkflowDispatchItemNumber` and `applyWorkflowDispatchFallbacks` to inject `inputs.item_number` fallbacks into extracted expressions.
pkg/workflow/compiler_yaml.go	Calls `applyWorkflowDispatchFallbacks` during prompt generation so expression mappings get updated before substitution.
pkg/workflow/concurrency.go	Extends concurrency group key expressions to include `inputs.item_number` where appropriate.
pkg/workflow/expression_extraction_test.go	Adds unit tests for detection and fallback patching of entity-number expressions.
pkg/workflow/concurrency_test.go	Adds test cases verifying concurrency keys include `inputs.item_number` for PR/issue/discussion label shorthand workflows.

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Copilot · 2026-03-06T03:36:11Z

pkg/workflow/expression_extraction.go

+// hasWorkflowDispatchItemNumber returns true when the rendered "on:" YAML contains
+// a workflow_dispatch trigger that exposes an item_number input. This is the
+// signature produced by the label trigger shorthand (e.g. "on: pull_request labeled my-label").
+func hasWorkflowDispatchItemNumber(on string) bool {
+	return strings.Contains(on, "workflow_dispatch") && strings.Contains(on, "item_number")


hasWorkflowDispatchItemNumber is likely to produce false positives because it matches any substring "item_number" (e.g., an input named my_item_number, a description mentioning item_number, etc.). That can cause later code to emit expressions referencing inputs.item_number even when that input is not actually defined, which may break validation (e.g., actionlint) and won’t fix the dispatch-number issue.

Consider tightening detection to match YAML keys (e.g., require workflow_dispatch: and item_number: and ideally inputs:) using a regex with word boundaries / line anchors, or parse the on: YAML into a map and check on.workflow_dispatch.inputs.item_number explicitly.

Suggested change

// hasWorkflowDispatchItemNumber returns true when the rendered "on:" YAML contains

// a workflow_dispatch trigger that exposes an item_number input. This is the

// signature produced by the label trigger shorthand (e.g. "on: pull_request labeled my-label").

func hasWorkflowDispatchItemNumber(on string) bool {

return strings.Contains(on, "workflow_dispatch") && strings.Contains(on, "item_number")

// workflowDispatchItemNumberRegex matches a workflow_dispatch trigger that defines

// an inputs.item_number key in the rendered "on:" YAML. It looks for:

//

// workflow_dispatch:

// inputs:

// item_number:

//

// with arbitrary but consistent indentation.

var workflowDispatchItemNumberRegex = regexp.MustCompile(

`(?m)^\s*workflow_dispatch:\s*(?:\n[ \t]+.*)*?\n[ \t]+inputs:\s*(?:\n[ \t]+.*)*?\n[ \t]+item_number:\s*`,

)

// hasWorkflowDispatchItemNumber returns true when the rendered "on:" YAML contains

// a workflow_dispatch trigger that exposes an item_number input. This is the

// signature produced by the label trigger shorthand (e.g. "on: pull_request labeled my-label").

func hasWorkflowDispatchItemNumber(on string) bool {

return workflowDispatchItemNumberRegex.MatchString(on)

Copilot · 2026-03-06T03:36:11Z

pkg/workflow/compiler_yaml.go

+	// Enhance entity number expressions with || inputs.item_number fallback when the
+	// workflow has a workflow_dispatch trigger with item_number (generated by the label
+	// trigger shorthand). Without this, manual dispatch runs receive an empty entity number.
+	applyWorkflowDispatchFallbacks(expressionMappings, data.On)
+


applyWorkflowDispatchFallbacks is invoked before the inline-mode expression extraction (Step 2). When c.inlinePrompt or data.InlinedImports is true, the main markdown expressions are extracted and appended to expressionMappings after this call, so the newly added mappings (including github.event.*.number) will not receive the || inputs.item_number fallback.

To make the fallback effective in inline/inlined-import modes, call applyWorkflowDispatchFallbacks after all expression mappings have been collected (e.g., after Step 2 appends inlineExprMappings), or call it again after appending those mappings.

Copilot · 2026-03-06T03:36:11Z

pkg/workflow/concurrency.go

 	} else if isPullRequestWorkflow(workflowData.On) && isIssueWorkflow(workflowData.On) {
 		// Mixed workflows with both issue and PR triggers
-		keys = append(keys, "${{ github.event.issue.number || github.event.pull_request.number || github.run_id }}")
+		if hasItemNumber {
+			keys = append(keys, "${{ github.event.issue.number || github.event.pull_request.number || inputs.item_number || github.run_id }}")
+		} else {
+			keys = append(keys, "${{ github.event.issue.number || github.event.pull_request.number || github.run_id }}")
+		}


The hasItemNumber branching introduces a lot of duplicated keys = append(keys, "${{ ... }}") strings across the trigger cases, which makes this function harder to maintain and increases the risk of future inconsistencies.

Consider building the base expression for each trigger case once, then conditionally inserting || inputs.item_number (e.g., via a small helper that takes the primary chain and injects the fallback when hasItemNumber is true).

pelikhan · 2026-03-06T03:38:27Z

@copilot make sure the feature is integrated in the overall parser of schedule. It should be parsed and return a structure data structure that indicates that itemNumber is used; instaed of parsing things again here.

…tured frontmatter parsing Co-authored-by: pelikhan <4175913+pelikhan@users.noreply.github.com>

Copilot · 2026-03-06T03:56:46Z

@copilot make sure the feature is integrated in the overall parser of schedule. It should be parsed and return a structure data structure that indicates that itemNumber is used; instaed of parsing thi...

Done in 9424ecc. Instead of re-parsing the rendered on: YAML string:

Added extractDispatchItemNumber(frontmatter map[string]any) bool in compiler_orchestrator_workflow.go that walks the structured frontmatter map (on → workflow_dispatch → inputs → item_number) directly
Added HasDispatchItemNumber bool to WorkflowData, populated by extractYAMLSections via extractDispatchItemNumber
All consumers (applyWorkflowDispatchFallbacks, buildConcurrencyGroupKeys) now read data.HasDispatchItemNumber / workflowData.HasDispatchItemNumber — no YAML string re-parsing anywhere

pelikhan · 2026-03-06T04:00:35Z

@copilot review and add tests for parser

…ispatchItemNumber pipeline Co-authored-by: pelikhan <4175913+pelikhan@users.noreply.github.com>

Copilot · 2026-03-06T04:11:09Z

@copilot review and add tests for parser

Added in 1745712. TestLabelTriggerShorthandPreprocessing and TestLabelTriggerShorthandPreprocessingErrors in schedule_preprocessing_test.go now cover the full parser pipeline:

For each entity type (pull_request, issues, discussion) and the pull-request alias: verify that preprocessScheduleFields expands the shorthand string into a frontmatter map with the correct workflow_dispatch.inputs.item_number structure, and that extractDispatchItemNumber returns true on the result.
Error path: comma-only label names → error "label trigger shorthand requires at least one label name".
Boundary: "pull_request labeled" (2 tokens, falls through to a plain activity-type trigger) → workflow_dispatch without item_number → extractDispatchItemNumber returns false.

Add two new glossary terms based on changes merged 2026-03-06: - GH_AW_AGENT_TOKEN: magic secret for assign-to-agent PAT fallback (PR #19796) - Label Trigger Shorthand: compact label trigger syntax with item_number (PR #19795) Co-authored-by: Copilot <223556219+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com>

Initial plan

d743659

Copilot AI assigned Copilot and pelikhan Mar 6, 2026

Copilot started work on behalf of pelikhan March 6, 2026 03:17 View session

fix: wire inputs.item_number fallback for label trigger shorthand wor…

6b49504

…kflows Co-authored-by: pelikhan <4175913+pelikhan@users.noreply.github.com>

Copilot AI changed the title ~~[WIP] Fix workflow_dispatch item_number for label trigger shorthand~~ Fix: wire inputs.item_number fallback for label trigger shorthand workflows Mar 6, 2026

Copilot finished work on behalf of pelikhan March 6, 2026 03:31

pelikhan marked this pull request as ready for review March 6, 2026 03:32

Merge branch 'main' into copilot/fix-workflow-dispatch-item-number

cb5bd5c

Copilot AI review requested due to automatic review settings March 6, 2026 03:32

Copilot started reviewing on behalf of pelikhan March 6, 2026 03:33 View session

Copilot AI reviewed Mar 6, 2026

View reviewed changes

Merge branch 'main' into copilot/fix-workflow-dispatch-item-number

41cb9c1

Copilot started work on behalf of pelikhan March 6, 2026 03:38 View session

refactor: integrate HasDispatchItemNumber into WorkflowData via struc…

9424ecc

…tured frontmatter parsing Co-authored-by: pelikhan <4175913+pelikhan@users.noreply.github.com>

Copilot finished work on behalf of pelikhan March 6, 2026 03:57

Copilot started work on behalf of pelikhan March 6, 2026 04:00 View session

test: add parser integration tests for label trigger shorthand → HasD…

1745712

…ispatchItemNumber pipeline Co-authored-by: pelikhan <4175913+pelikhan@users.noreply.github.com>

Copilot finished work on behalf of pelikhan March 6, 2026 04:11

pelikhan merged commit ce49917 into main Mar 6, 2026

pelikhan deleted the copilot/fix-workflow-dispatch-item-number branch March 6, 2026 07:57

Copilot AI mentioned this pull request Mar 6, 2026

chore: merge main into portable-gh-aw-home and recompile #19817

Merged

github-actions bot mentioned this pull request Mar 6, 2026

[docs] Update glossary - daily scan #19822

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Fix: wire `inputs.item_number` fallback for label trigger shorthand workflows#19795

Fix: wire `inputs.item_number` fallback for label trigger shorthand workflows#19795
pelikhan merged 6 commits intomainfrom
copilot/fix-workflow-dispatch-item-number

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