PNPM Workspace example - erroneous for mono-repo setups

[SStranks]

The example from the docs: PNPM Workspaces.

The working-directory flag requires the presence of a lock-file in that location, and it will abort the run if one isn't located. If a project is a true PNPM mono-repo then this example is erroneous because there should only be one pnpm-lock.yaml at the root of the project that dictates the entire mono-repo; having multiple lock-files causes both version conflicts and cache misses.

working-directory is required for the installation step of the cypress module, which in a mono-repo will be confined to that folder so that other workspace projects can have their own versions if necessary. But the installation can't take place because of the aforementioned lock-file issue.

Manually running the pnpm installation before using the cypress-action does not resolve the issue either, due to the internals of cypress-action itself using npm rather than pnpm so it can't orientate itself to the dependency structure - parallel to this I saw a log error involving npx being used to get a 'cache list', when I tried to manually cache the cypress binary and pass it in.

Not sure what the solution should be, but the requirement for the pnpm-lock.yaml in the working-directory seems to be the block.

[MikeMcC399]

@SStranks

You are reporting difficulties with the pnpm workspaces example.

The example for pnpm workspaces has its own virtual "root" directory located at examples/start-and-pnpm-workspaces where there is one pnpm lock file examples/start-and-pnpm-workspaces/pnpm-lock.yaml. The workspace directories under this "root" directory contain package.json files and no pnpm lock files.

I checked that the examples/start-and-pnpm-workspaces can be installed and run with different versions of Cypress in the two example workspaces.

The action does not natively support pnpm workspaces and there is a long-running open feature request #1144 to provide this support. The example does its best to work around this restriction.

In this repo, the examples directory covers examples for multiple package managers: npm, pnpm, Yarn v1 Classic and Yarn Modern, which makes it a non-typical monorepo. Because the examples are in subdirectories, and not in the root of the repo, each of the workflows needs to use a working-directory option setting.

Each of the examples in the repo runs successfully, including the workflow .github/workflows/example-start-and-pnpm-workspaces.yml. The repo is set up so that users can fork it, run the examples themselves, and make modifications if they like. You may want to take advantage of this.

For "how-to" type support you can connect to the Cypress technical community on Discord.

[SStranks]

The action does not natively support pnpm workspaces and there is a long-running open feature request #1144 to provide this support. The example does its best to work around this restriction.

I understand, however all I would say is that in the scenario I described the 'work around' - having sub-folder pnpm-lock.yaml files - invalidates the core reasons for using pnpm in the first place (versioning, caching). For me personally I can operate without the github-action and set it up all manually, but for teams using a mono-repo setup it would probably be nice to have the functionality of the github-action and pnpm.

[MikeMcC399]

@SStranks

I can operate without the github-action and set it up all manually,

• That is certainly a valid implementation strategy.

it would probably be nice to have the functionality of the github-action and pnpm.

• This is what would be covered if Add workspace support for pnpm #1144 were to be implemented. In the meantime it would make sense to be clearer in the README documentation that pnpm workspaces are not currently supported by the action, and that the example in pnpm workspaces is only a workaround for missing functionality.

• cypress-io/github-action was originally written for npm and Yarn v1 Classic only. pnpm (without workspaces) was added through a community contribution.

[MikeMcC399]

@SStranks

• Thanks for raising this issue! I've logged another related issue as Renovate PRs failing in example-start-and-pnpm-workspaces #1594. Unfortunately this is exposing that the pnpm workspace example is really just a workaround, and in fact it is currently not working reliably 🙁

[MikeMcC399]

• Documentation and example workaround workflow changes for pnpm workspaces are proposed in PR test: use native pnpm install for pnpm workspace example #1596
• Full support for pnpm workspaces remains open in feature request Add workspace support for pnpm #1144

[github-actions]

🎉 This issue has been resolved in version 6.10.5 🎉

The release is available on:

• npm package (@latest dist-tag)
• GitHub release

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