Actions Usage Metrics and Actions Performance Metrics

[endersonmenezes]

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Dear GitHub Product Team,

My name is Enderson Menezes, and I work as an SRE at Stone Co., a leading Brazilian fintech focused on empowering entrepreneurs through innovative payment and financial solutions. As part of my role, I oversee the optimization of CI/CD pipelines and cost management strategies for our organization.

Currently, we utilize the Actions Usage Metrics and Actions Performance Metrics available through the GitHub web interface to monitor resource usage and performance across workflows and jobs. These metrics are critical for our internal cost management project, enabling us to identify inefficiencies and optimize our infrastructure.

While we appreciate the existing API endpoints such as Get GitHub Actions Billing for an Enterprise, they primarily focus on GitHub-hosted runners and lack detailed insights into self-hosted runners, which are integral to our operations. Additionally, the aggregated metrics currently available in the web interface (e.g., execution times, queue times, failure rates) are not accessible programmatically, limiting automation capabilities.

Why API Support is Essential

1. Comprehensive Data Access:

   • Include metrics for self-hosted runners (e.g., minutes used, failure rates, queue times) alongside GitHub-hosted runner data.
   • Provide aggregated metrics at organization, repository, workflow, and job levels.

2. Automation & Integration:

   • Enable automated data collection and integration with internal tools like cost management systems or observability platforms (e.g., Prometheus).
   • Facilitate real-time monitoring and proactive optimizations based on API-driven insights.

3. Cost Management:

   • Allow detailed breakdowns of resource usage by runner type (self-hosted vs. GitHub-hosted) and operating system.
   • Help organizations track usage trends and optimize their infrastructure accordingly.

Suggested Enhancements to the API

We propose extending the existing GitHub Actions REST API with endpoints that provide:

• Usage Metrics: Aggregated data on minutes consumed by workflows and jobs across both GitHub-hosted and self-hosted runners.
• Performance Metrics: Key indicators such as average run times, queue times, failure rates, and success rates for workflows and jobs.
• Self-Hosted Runner Insights: Detailed usage statistics (e.g., minutes used per runner) and performance metrics specific to self-hosted runners.

For example:

• Add a new endpoint for aggregated performance metrics at the organization or repository level (similar to what is available in the web interface).

Benefits of This Feature

Providing these metrics via API would empower organizations like ours to:

• Automate resource monitoring and reporting processes.
• Gain deeper insights into workflow efficiency across all runner types.
• Optimize costs by identifying high-consumption workflows or underutilized resources.

We believe this feature would significantly enhance enterprise users' ability to manage their GitHub Actions infrastructure effectively while aligning with GitHub's commitment to developer productivity and transparency.

Thank you for considering this request. I would be happy to provide additional details about our use case or collaborate on defining requirements for this feature.

Best regards,

[github-actions[bot]]

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