various pipeline improvements #2667

Job	Run time
build	5m 49s
test_when_cache_present (0, 11, 672)	2m 4s
test_when_cache_missing	0s
test_when_cache_present (1, 11, 672)	2m 1s
test_when_cache_present (2, 11, 672)	2m 1s
test_when_cache_present (3, 11, 672)	1m 44s
test_when_cache_present (4, 11, 672)	1m 59s
test_when_cache_present (5, 11, 672)	2m 3s
test_when_cache_present (6, 11, 672)	2m 0s
test_when_cache_present (7, 11, 672)	1m 58s
test_when_cache_present (8, 11, 672)	1m 56s
test_when_cache_present (9, 11, 672)	1m 59s
test_when_cache_present (10, 11, 672)	2m 2s
test_when_cache_present (11, 11, 672)	2m 0s
save_test_times_when_cache_missing	0s
save_test_times_when_cache_present	0s
	29m 36s

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