various pipeline improvements #2664

Job	Run time
build	8m 22s
test_when_cache_missing	0s
test_when_cache_present (0, 11, 672)	31m 34s
test_when_cache_present (1, 11, 672)	29m 46s
test_when_cache_present (2, 11, 672)	29m 5s
test_when_cache_present (3, 11, 672)	30m 33s
test_when_cache_present (4, 11, 672)	28m 56s
test_when_cache_present (5, 11, 672)	37m 26s
test_when_cache_present (6, 11, 672)	29m 8s
test_when_cache_present (7, 11, 672)	31m 42s
test_when_cache_present (8, 11, 672)	33m 17s
test_when_cache_present (9, 11, 672)	32m 23s
test_when_cache_present (10, 11, 672)	32m 41s
test_when_cache_present (11, 11, 672)	24m 6s
save_test_times_when_cache_missing	0s
save_test_times_when_cache_present	19s
	6h 19m 18s

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