FAQ

Are runners persistent or ephemeral?

Ephemeral. Each job gets a fresh Kubernetes pod. No state persists between jobs. The pod is provisioned when your job is queued and deleted after completion.

Is Docker available?

Yes. Every runner includes a Docker-in-Docker sidecar. You can use docker build, docker run, Docker Compose, and Buildx out of the box. Docker communicates over TLS within the pod.

What architectures are supported?

RISC-V 64-bit (riscv64) only. All runners execute on physical RISC-V hardware. There is no RISC-V emulation. Binaries must be compiled for riscv64.

What operating systems are available?

Ubuntu 24.04 and Ubuntu 26.04. The OS version is determined by the runner label you choose (e.g., ubuntu-24.04-riscv vs ubuntu-26.04-riscv).

How do I get access?

Install the GitHub App on your organization or personal account. The service is open to all. No allowlist or approval required. Contact the RISE project team if the app installation does not trigger runners for your workflows.

Can I use this for personal repositories?

Yes. Install the personal account app. It registers runners at the repository level and requires Administration permission (the minimum GitHub allows for repo-scoped runner registration). See Install the GitHub App for details.

How many jobs can run concurrently?

Concurrency is limited by:

1. Hardware capacity: each RISC-V node runs at most one job at a time (enforced by the device plugin)
2. Per-entity limits: each organization or personal account has a configurable maximum number of concurrent workers across all pools

How long can a job run?

Pods have an active deadline of approximately 6 days. Jobs exceeding this limit are terminated. For most CI workloads, this is not a constraint.

What if my job is queued but no runner picks it up?

The worker checks for pending jobs every 15 seconds. If no RISC-V nodes with available capacity match your label, the job remains queued until a node becomes available. Check the Runner Labels Reference to make sure you are using a valid label.

Can I SSH into the runner?

No. Runners are ephemeral and not accessible outside the job execution context. Debug using workflow step outputs, artifact uploads, or adding diagnostic commands to your workflow.

What happens if a runner pod crashes?

The worker’s cleanup loop (every 15 seconds) detects pods in Failed state and deletes them. The corresponding Redis worker record is also cleaned up. GitHub will mark the job as failed. You can re-run the job from the GitHub Actions UI.

Where are the runner images hosted?

Images are stored in the Scaleway Container Registry (rg.fr-par.scw.cloud). They are rebuilt daily and on every push to the main branch of riscv-runner-images.