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The goal of this recipe is to use Python tools in GitHub Actions without every workflow run hitting PyPI to download a fresh copy of the tool and its dependencies.

Willison states the underlying motivation for the technique: avoiding repeated, redundant PyPI downloads on every CI run. ✦ AI generated

Simon Willison · Simon Willison's Weblog · 2026-07-14 · original ↗

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My goal here is to use Python tools in GitHub Actions without every run of the workflow hitting PyPI to download a fresh copy of the tool and its dependencies.

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▦ PyPI ✳ GitHub Actions

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The Python Package Index (PyPI) now rejects new files being uploaded to releases that are older than 14 days.Seth Larson · Simon Willison's Weblog · conf 85%

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provides context → Setting a UV_EXCLUDE_NEWER environment variable to a fixed date and including that date in the GitHub Actions cache key produces a cache-friendly way to run uvx tool-name in workflows.Simon Willison · Simon Willison's Weblog provides context → Setting UV_EXCLUDE_NEWER to a specific date makes uvx tool-name resolve to the most recent tool version available as of that date, and the cache can be busted and tools upgraded simply by bumping that date later.Simon Willison · Simon Willison's Weblog