[P1] Smoke Multi PR: safe_outputs fails on schedule runs (add_comment target:triggering) #24096

Workflow Failure

Workflow: Smoke Multi PR
Failure rate: 5/5 recent schedule runs (Mar 29 – Apr 2, 2026)
Latest failed run: #604 (2026-04-02)

Error

##[error]✗ Message 3 (add_comment) failed: Target is "triggering" but not running
         in issue or pull request context, skipping add_comment
Failed: 1
##[error]1 safe output(s) failed

Root Cause Analysis

The smoke-multi-pr workflow has status-comment: true in its frontmatter, which generates an add_comment safe output message with target: triggering. On schedule-triggered runs, there is no triggering issue or pull request context — causing the safe outputs system to fail hard (exit non-zero) instead of silently skipping.

The workflow frontmatter excerpt:

on:
  schedule: every 24h
  workflow_dispatch:
  pull_request:
    types: [labeled]
    names: ["smoke-multi-pr"]
  reaction: "eyes"
  status-comment: true    # ← This generates add_comment with target:triggering

The agent job and PR creation appear to succeed — only the safe_outputs job fails due to this issue.

Evidence

Impact

• Smoke Multi PR cannot report success/failure on schedule runs
• Every scheduled smoke test of the multi-PR creation feature is marked as failed
• Creates noise and masks genuine failures

Suggested Fixes

Option A (Recommended): Fix safe-outputs to silently skip status-comment on schedule runs
The safe outputs system should detect when there's no triggering context and silently skip add_comment with target: triggering rather than counting it as a failure.

Option B: Remove status-comment from workflow frontmatter
If the workflow doesn't need to comment on triggering PRs, remove status-comment: true from the frontmatter.

Option C: Add conditional logic
Use update-issue: target: triggering in frontmatter to only enable the feature when there's a triggering context.

Related

• Workflow Health Dashboard — 2026-04-02
• Previous related issue: [plan] Investigate and fix safe_outputs failures in Smoke Update Cross-Repo PR and Smoke Multi PR #22246 (closed)

Detected by Workflow Health Manager · 2026-04-02

tools:
  github:
    min-integrity: approved  # merged | approved | unapproved | none

Generated by Workflow Health Manager - Meta-Orchestrator · ◷

• expires on Apr 3, 2026, 12:13 PM UTC