bug: compiler single-quotes `--allow-domains` breaking `${{ }}` GA expressions, causing HTTP 422 on workflow dispatch

[bryanchen-d]

Summary

When --allow-domains contains a GitHub Actions expression (e.g. a ternary using ${{ env.VAR == 'value' && ... || ... }}), the compiler generates single-quoted shell escaping that prevents GitHub Actions from evaluating the expression, causing HTTP 422 Unexpected inputs errors when dispatching workflows via gh workflow run or the API.

Related

This is a more severe variant of the SC1003 quoting issues previously tracked in #17671 and #17850 (closed). Those issues covered static domain lists. This issue covers ${{ }} expressions inside --allow-domains, which breaks at the GitHub Actions layer, not just shellcheck.

Reproduction

A workflow .md with a network section like:

network:
  allowed:
    - "${{ env.MCP_ENV == 'staging' && env.MCP_URL_STAGING || env.MCP_URL_PROD }}"
    - "errors.code.visualstudio.com"

Compiles to a lock file with:

--allow-domains '${{ env.MCP_ENV == '\''staging'\'' && env.MCP_URL_STAGING || env.MCP_URL_PROD }},errors.code.visualstudio.com'

The '\''staging'\'' shell escape sequences are embedded inside the ${{ }} expression string, which GitHub Actions sees as a malformed expression. When gh workflow run sends the dispatch event, GitHub returns:

HTTP 422: Unexpected inputs provided

Expected behavior

The compiler should emit double-quoted arguments when the domain value contains a ${{ }} expression, so GitHub Actions can evaluate it before the shell sees it:

--allow-domains "${{ env.MCP_ENV == 'staging' && env.MCP_URL_STAGING || env.MCP_URL_PROD }},errors.code.visualstudio.com"

Since ${{ }} is interpolated by GitHub Actions before the shell runs, 'staging' inside the expression is fine and the shell never needs to escape it.

Workaround

Manually post-process the compiled lock files to replace:

--allow-domains '${{ env.MCP_ENV == '\''staging'\'' && ... }},<domains>'

with:

--allow-domains "${{ env.MCP_ENV == 'staging' && ... }},<domains>"

This must be reapplied every time the workflow is recompiled (confirmed with v0.68.1).

Environment

• gh aw version: v0.68.1
• Affected workflows: any workflow using a ${{ }} ternary in network.allowed