Why the difference between Composite Actions inputs and reusable workflow inputs

[MarcHagen]

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With a workflow that has a workflow_call: you can add inputs.
These inputs have a type and default value reflecting the type.

  workflow_call:
    inputs:
      fail-on-low-coverage:
        default: false <<< this is actually a boolean
        description: Should this workflow fail when the coverage is below the minimum
        required: false
        type: boolean
      coverage-low:
        default: 60 <<< this is actually a integer
        description: Minimal required percentage of code that should be covered by tests, optionally fail when coverage is below minimum
        required: false
        type: number

Docs: https://docs.github.com/en/actions/using-workflows/workflow-syntax-for-github-actions#onworkflow_callinputs
Schema validation: https://json.schemastore.org/github-workflow.json

Composite Actions also have inputs but lack the type: key and are always strings.

inputs:
  php-extensions:
    default: dom, curl, libxml, mbstring, mailparse, zip, pcntl, pdo, pdo_mysql <<< string
    description: PHP extensions to enable
    required: false
  fail-on-low-coverage:
    default: "false" <<< must be string
    description: Should this workflow fail when the coverage is below the minimum
    required: false
  coverage-low:
    default: "60"  <<< must be string
    description: Minimal required percentage of code that should be covered by tests, optionally fail when coverage is below minimum
    required: false

Docs: https://docs.github.com/en/actions/creating-actions/metadata-syntax-for-github-actions#inputs
Schema validation: https://json.schemastore.org/github-action.json

Why is this different here?
It seems that only the workflow adheres to the input-context while (composite) actions are whole different

also the name for both is so confusing. GitHub Actions, which has workflows and actions which both are separate things.

[gilzow]

Following as I would love to see the type property added to action inputs.

also the name for both is so confusing. GitHub Actions, which has workflows and actions which both are separate things.

Wait until you read about Status vs Checks vs Status Checks!!! 😄

[gilzow]

while looking for something else, I stumbled upon this question again. I've noticed that while the GitHub Actions platform doesnt support the type property for an input in a custom action, it also doesnt seem to complain if you've included it anyway.

I often build my actions as workflows with the workflow_dispatch event first to build & test, and then move them into an action. I'm doing a presentation and while building my action for the demo, I accidentally forgot to remove the type property from the inputs.
https://github.com/gilzow/github-actions-presentation-vrt/blob/main/action.yaml#L6

But I was able to use the action without GitHub Actions platform complaining about them being there: https://github.com/gilzow/github-actions-presentation/actions/runs/6174619490/job/16759624988

[MarcHagen]

Probably because all action inputs are already string.
From memory adding type: boolean would break it. OR it would not care and still be a string 😅

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[MarcHagen]

No resolution yet, not marking as resolved.

[mara004]

See also actions/runner#2238