Test Release Canary

The Release Canary (.github/workflows/release-canary.yml) smoke-tests the artifacts a Release Dev run just published. It is the last automated checkpoint before tagging a public release: if the canary is red, the published dev artifacts do not install on a stock environment.

What the canary verifies

Job	Runner	Verifies
macos	macos-latest-xlarge	Installs the dev Homebrew artifacts, reaches the VM gateway, and creates, executes in, and deletes a sandbox.
ubuntu-deb	ubuntu-latest	Installs the dev Debian package, reaches the Docker gateway, and creates, executes in, and deletes a sandbox.
fedora	fedora:latest container	Installs the dev RPM packages, reaches the Podman gateway, and creates, executes in, and deletes a sandbox.
ubuntu-snap-system-docker	ubuntu-latest	Uses install.sh to install the snap from latest/edge, reuses system Docker, verifies the packaged prover version and a local policy boundary check, reaches the Docker gateway, creates, executes in, and deletes a sandbox, and verifies that the Docker snap is not installed.
ubuntu-snap-docker-preflight	ubuntu-latest	Verifies that install.sh rejects the OpenShell snap path when Docker is absent or supplied by the Docker snap, without installing OpenShell.
kubernetes	ubuntu-latest + kind	Installs the dev Helm chart, reaches the in-cluster gateway, and creates, executes in, and deletes a sandbox using the published runtime images.

All canary jobs disable anonymous OpenShell telemetry. Host package jobs inject OPENSHELL_TELEMETRY_ENABLED=false through the service environment, and the Kubernetes job installs with server.telemetryEnabled=false, so smoke traffic does not contribute to product usage metrics.

The workflow sets OPENSHELL_VERSION=dev for every install.sh job. Positive jobs consume the rolling dev release produced by the triggering workflow. The system-Docker snap lane tracks latest/edge; the missing-Docker lane exits before installing a snap. The Debian and Kubernetes CLI lanes remove snapd so they continue to exercise the dev Debian package. Kubernetes pins the matching 0.0.0-dev chart and :dev images.

RPM package installation also has tmachine conformance coverage in Branch E2E Checks (with test:e2e), Release Dev, Release, and Pre-release. Those lanes use the rpm installer on fedora-podman-rootful and fedora-podman-rootless with candidate CLI and gateway RPMs and matching runtime images. Branch RPM package builds run on every approved branch run, independently of optional E2E labels.

The host-package jobs exercise fresh installs, not upgrades from a persisted schema-v1 gateway config. Validate Homebrew and RPM exact-default migration with the release-tooling and package lifecycle tests before relying on the canary.

The canary does not install or import @nvidia/openshell-sdk. TypeScript SDK validation lives in the TypeScript SDK branch check, including a publish dry-run. The tagged release workflow publishes the package to GitHub Packages; verify that job directly when diagnosing SDK publication failures.

Trigger paths

The workflow has two triggers:

on:
  workflow_dispatch:
  workflow_run:
    workflows: ["Release Dev"]
    types: [completed]

• Automatic. Every successful Release Dev run (on main or a manual dispatch of Release Dev) fires the canary. Each job gates on github.event.workflow_run.conclusion == 'success' so a failed Release Dev does not run the canary.
• Manual. workflow_dispatch lets you run the canary on demand against any branch's workflow definition.

When dispatched manually, github.event.workflow_run.head_sha is empty and the workflow falls back to github.sha (the branch tip) for the install.sh URL.

Manual dispatch

Run the canary as-is on the current branch:

gh workflow run release-canary.yml --ref "$(git branch --show-current)"

Watch the run that starts:

sleep 5  # let GitHub register the dispatch
gh run list --workflow release-canary.yml --limit 1
gh run watch "$(gh run list --workflow release-canary.yml --limit 1 --json databaseId --jq '.[0].databaseId')"

View only failed jobs after completion:

gh run view <run-id> --log-failed

Iterating on the canary itself

When you change release-canary.yml on a branch, a manual dispatch on that branch tests your branch's workflow logic against main's published dev artifacts (0.0.0-dev chart, :dev images, and the dev GitHub release). This is what you want for iterating on the canary — you're validating that the canary still works against known-good artifacts.

Note install.sh is pulled from raw.githubusercontent.com/NVIDIA/OpenShell/${head_sha}/install.sh, so changes to install.sh on your branch are exercised even though packages come from the latest public dev release and the snap comes from latest/edge.

Testing artifacts from a specific SHA

Release Dev publishes two chart versions for every dev build (see .github/actions/release-helm-oci/action.yml:89-102):

• oci://ghcr.io/nvidia/openshell/helm-chart:0.0.0-dev — floating, overwritten on every main push.
• oci://ghcr.io/nvidia/openshell/helm-chart:0.0.0-dev.<sha> — immutable, appVersion set to the same SHA so it pulls the matching gateway, sandbox, and supervisor images.

To smoke-test the chart for a specific dev build, dispatch Release Dev on the branch first, then run the kind canary steps locally pointed at the SHA-pinned chart (see "Local kind reproduction" below). The release-canary workflow itself does not currently expose chart_version / image_tag inputs.

Local kind reproduction

The kubernetes job can be reproduced on any machine with Docker and mise install-provided kubectl + helm:

kind create cluster --name release-canary-local

bash e2e/support/install-agent-sandbox.sh

helm install openshell oci://ghcr.io/nvidia/openshell/helm-chart \
  --version 0.0.0-dev \
  --namespace openshell --create-namespace \
  --set server.disableTls=true \
  --set server.telemetryEnabled=false \
  --wait --timeout 5m

kubectl wait --namespace openshell \
  --for=condition=Ready pod \
  --selector="app.kubernetes.io/name=openshell,app.kubernetes.io/instance=openshell" \
  --timeout=300s

kubectl port-forward --namespace openshell svc/openshell 8080:8080 &
openshell gateway add http://127.0.0.1:8080 --local --name kind
openshell status

Keep pkiInitJob.enabled=true (the chart default), even when server.disableTls=true. The hook also generates the sandbox JWT signing secret that the gateway pod always mounts.

Swap 0.0.0-dev for 0.0.0-dev.<sha> to pin to a specific dev build. Tear down with kind delete cluster --name release-canary-local.

Loopback registration auto-derives the gateway name to openshell if --name is omitted, which collides with the install.sh-installed local gateway — always pass --name kind (or another distinct name) when registering in addition to a local install.

Diagnosing failures

Symptom	Likely cause	Where to look
macos/ubuntu-deb/fedora job fails on install.sh	Dev release missing an asset, checksum mismatch, or install.sh regression on this branch.	Job log around the curl … install.sh | sh step.
Sandbox create or exec fails	Published sandbox and supervisor artifacts are missing, incompatible, or cannot establish the protected runtime channel.	Gateway logs plus Docker, Podman, VM, snap, or Kubernetes runtime diagnostics for the job.
macos/ubuntu-deb/fedora job fails on openshell status	Local gateway service did not start (systemd/brew/podman). Often a driver issue.	Service logs in the job log; OPENSHELL_COMPUTE_DRIVER env in the "Ensure …" step.
ubuntu-snap-system-docker fails during install.sh	System Docker was unavailable to the runner user, the edge revision or automatic interfaces were unavailable, or the user gateway did not become reachable.	Failure diagnostics dump system Docker, snap service/connection/change state, user and legacy gateway journals, snap logs, and port 17670 listeners.
ubuntu-snap-system-docker fails during the prover checks	The prover artifact is missing or packaged for the wrong architecture, openshell.prover is not exposed or confined to read the test policies, or its solver linkage is not runnable.	The Install and check status and Check a policy boundary with the snap prover steps, plus snap info openshell and snap connections openshell.
ubuntu-snap-docker-preflight unexpectedly succeeds	The installer no longer fails before installing the OpenShell snap when Docker is absent or supplied by the Docker snap.	Inspect install.log, docker-snap.log, snap list, and snapd changes.
kubernetes job fails on helm install --wait	Chart did not deploy in 5 min — usually image pull failure or readiness probe failing.	"Diagnostics on failure" step dumps helm status, manifest, pod describe, pod logs.
kubernetes job fails on kubectl wait	Gateway pod stuck CrashLoopBackOff or ImagePullBackOff.	Diagnostics dump; check :dev image existence at ghcr.io/nvidia/openshell/gateway.
kubernetes job fails on openshell gateway add or status	Port-forward not reachable, or CLI/gateway proto mismatch.	port-forward.log and openshell gateway list in the diagnostics dump.

The kubernetes job's diagnostics step (only runs if: failure()) emits, in order: helm status, rendered manifest, kubectl get all, pod descriptions, pod logs (200 lines per container), port-forward log, gateway list, CLI version. Read it top-to-bottom — most failures fall out by the manifest or pod logs.

Related

• helm-dev-environment skill — local k3d-based dev environment (more featureful than the canary's kind cluster, but uses Skaffold-built local images, not published artifacts).
• watch-github-actions skill — generic gh run workflow monitoring.
• debug-openshell-cluster skill — runtime gateway/sandbox diagnostics that pair with the kind job's diagnostics dump.