📊 EPSS Score Update workflow (projectdiscovery/nuclei-templates)

The 📊 EPSS Score Update workflow from projectdiscovery/nuclei-templates, explained and optimized by Latchkey.

What it does

This is the 📊 EPSS Score Update workflow from the projectdiscovery/nuclei-templates repository, a real project running GitHub Actions. It is shown here with attribution under its MIT license.

Below, Latchkey shows a faster, safer version produced by its optimization engine.

The workflow

name: 📊 EPSS Score Update

on:
  schedule:
    # Run daily at 2:00 AM UTC
    - cron: '0 2 * * *'
  workflow_dispatch:

jobs:
  update-epss:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    if: github.repository == 'projectdiscovery/nuclei-templates'
    steps:
      - name: Checkout repository
        uses: actions/checkout@v7

      - name: Setup Python
        uses: actions/setup-python@v6
        with:
          python-version: '3.11'

      - name: Install dependencies
        run: |
          pip install requests pyyaml

      - name: Update EPSS scores
        run: python .github/scripts/update-epss.py

      - name: Check for changes
        id: changes
        run: |
          if git diff --quiet; then
            echo "changes=false" >> $GITHUB_OUTPUT
          else
            echo "changes=true" >> $GITHUB_OUTPUT
          fi

      - name: Setup Git
        if: steps.changes.outputs.changes == 'true'
        uses: projectdiscovery/actions/setup/git@v1

      - name: Commit changes
        if: steps.changes.outputs.changes == 'true'
        uses: projectdiscovery/actions/commit@v1
        with:
          files: '**/cves/**/*.yaml'
          message: 'chore: update EPSS scores 🤖'

      - name: Push changes
        if: steps.changes.outputs.changes == 'true'
        run: |
          git pull origin $GITHUB_REF --rebase
          git push origin $GITHUB_REF

The same workflow, on Latchkey

Estimated ~20% faster on cache hits, plus fewer wasted runs and a safer supply chain. Added and changed lines are highlighted.

name: 📊 EPSS Score Update
 
on:
  schedule:
    # Run daily at 2:00 AM UTC
    - cron: '0 2 * * *'
  workflow_dispatch:
 
jobs:
  update-epss:
    timeout-minutes: 30
    runs-on: latchkey-small
    if: github.repository == 'projectdiscovery/nuclei-templates'
    steps:
      - name: Checkout repository
        uses: actions/checkout@v7
 
      - name: Setup Python
        uses: actions/setup-python@v6
        with:
          cache: 'pip'
          python-version: '3.11'
 
      - name: Install dependencies
        run: |
          pip install requests pyyaml
 
      - name: Update EPSS scores
        run: python .github/scripts/update-epss.py
 
      - name: Check for changes
        id: changes
        run: |
          if git diff --quiet; then
            echo "changes=false" >> $GITHUB_OUTPUT
          else
            echo "changes=true" >> $GITHUB_OUTPUT
          fi
 
      - name: Setup Git
        if: steps.changes.outputs.changes == 'true'
        uses: projectdiscovery/actions/setup/git@v1
 
      - name: Commit changes
        if: steps.changes.outputs.changes == 'true'
        uses: projectdiscovery/actions/commit@v1
        with:
          files: '**/cves/**/*.yaml'
          message: 'chore: update EPSS scores 🤖'
 
      - name: Push changes
        if: steps.changes.outputs.changes == 'true'
        run: |
          git pull origin $GITHUB_REF --rebase
          git push origin $GITHUB_REF

What changed

• Run on Latchkey managed runners with one line (runs-on), which apply the fixes below automatically and self-heal transient failures. This example uses latchkey-small; pick the runner size that fits the job.
• Cache dependency installs on the setup step so they are served from cache.
• Add a job timeout so a hung step cannot burn hours of runner time.

1 third-party action is referenced by a movable tag. Pin it to the commit SHA (Latchkey resolves and applies this automatically) so a repointed tag cannot change what runs.

What Latchkey heals here

This workflow has steps that commonly fail on transient issues (network, registries, flaky browsers). On Latchkey managed runners they are detected, retried, and self-healed instead of failing your build:

• Dependency installs

This workflow runs 1 job per trigger. On Latchkey the same minutes cost up to 58% less than GitHub-hosted, with zero queue time.

Actions used in this workflow