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Maven / GitHub Actions Interview Questions

What is the difference between push, pull_request, and workflow_dispatch triggers?

These three triggers cover the most common CI/CD use-cases but serve very different purposes. Here is a direct comparison:

GitHub Actions Trigger Comparison
Trigger When it fires Typical use-case Key options
push A commit is pushed to a branch or a tag is created Deploy to staging/production after merging to main; publish a release on tag push branches:, tags:, paths:
pull_request A PR is opened, its head branch is updated (synchronised), or specific PR activity occurs (labeled, closed, etc.) Run tests and linting on every proposed change before it merges; gate merges with required status checks branches: (base branch filter), types: (activity type), paths:
workflow_dispatch An operator manually triggers the workflow from the GitHub UI, the REST API, or gh workflow run Ad-hoc releases, environment-specific deployments, data migration scripts that should not run automatically inputs: — define typed parameters (string, boolean, choice, environment) that the operator fills in before running

A common pattern is to combine all three: use pull_request for pre-merge tests, push on main for deployment, and workflow_dispatch for manual rollback or hotfix releases. Each trigger runs independently so you can fine-tune which steps run for each event using if: github.event_name == 'push' inside steps.

Which trigger fires when a branch's commits are pushed but NOT necessarily tied to a pull request?
What unique feature does workflow_dispatch provide that push and pull_request do not?

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