GitHub Deployment Timing Out

September 6, 2023

Today I added two new publications to the Getz Lab web site. Merging the changes into the repo's master branch, as expected, triggered the GitHub pages build and deployment workflow. The deploy job failed, unexpectedly, with a timeout:

Run actions/deploy-pages@v2 Artifact exchange URL: https://pipelinesghubeus23.actions.githubusercontent.com/vqFsCoLElZnvFgvrSdEJ7L64C2ygl[9](https://github.com/getzlab/getzlab.github.io/actions/runs/6100847421/job/16556431384#step:2:10)RVKZoDLksamNvAxYI8k2/_apis/pipelines/workflows/6[10](https://github.com/getzlab/getzlab.github.io/actions/runs/6100847421/job/16556431384#step:2:11)0847421/artifacts?api-version=6.0-preview Creating Pages deployment with payload: { "artifact_url": "https://pipelines.actions.githubusercontent.com/vqFsCoLElZnvFgvrSdEJ7L64C2ygl9RVKZoDLksamNvAxYI8k2/_apis/pipelines/1/runs/203/artifacts?artifactName=github-pages&%24expand=SignedContent", "pages_build_version": "9e19ac592d975dfab65c0128a5[11](https://github.com/getzlab/getzlab.github.io/actions/runs/6100847421/job/16556431384#step:2:12)4882f6aee113", "oidc_token": "***" } Created deployment for 9e19ac592d975dfab65c0[12](https://github.com/getzlab/getzlab.github.io/actions/runs/6100847421/job/16556431384#step:2:13)8a5114882f6aee1[13](https://github.com/getzlab/getzlab.github.io/actions/runs/6100847421/job/16556431384#step:2:14), ID: 9e19ac592d975dfab65c0128a51[14](https://github.com/getzlab/getzlab.github.io/actions/runs/6100847421/job/16556431384#step:2:15)882f6aee113 Getting Pages deployment status... Current status: Getting Pages deployment status... Current status: Getting Pages deployment status... Current status: Getting Pages deployment status... Current status: Getting Pages deployment status...

...

Getting Pages deployment status... Current status: Error: Timeout reached, aborting! Error: Timeout reached, aborting! Canceling Pages deployment... Canceled deployment with ID 9e19ac592d975dfab65c0128a5114882f6aee113

There is a 10 minute upper limit on the deployment of a github pages website's artifacts to the backend. I wasn't able to determine the specific reason for the failure - we are well below the 1G limit on the total size of our site artifacts. However, I was able to fix the problem employing a variation of the solution spelled out in https://github.com/orgs/community/discussions/49948. In particular, from Settings, going to Code Automation > Pages, I first set the Branch from which the GitHub Pages site is built to None. I then confirmed that the site was not longer available (could go to the main page, but got 404s anything beyond that). Then, I reset to the building branch to master. That triggered a rebuild and deployment of the site, and the problem went away!