# Creating a conditional build step based on what actually changed

**URL:** https://drone.discourse.group/t/creating-a-conditional-build-step-based-on-what-actually-changed/13991
**Category:** Drone Support
**Created:** [April 26, 2023, 6:24pm UTC](https://drone.discourse.group/t/creating-a-conditional-build-step-based-on-what-actually-changed/13991 "2023-04-26T18:24:11Z")
**Posts on this page:** 2
**Page:** 1

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### Author: ![allenFisher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ce7236/32.png) [@allenFisher](https://drone.discourse.group/u/allenFisher)
#### Post date: [April 26, 2023, 6:24pm UTC](https://drone.discourse.group/t/creating-a-conditional-build-step-based-on-what-actually-changed/13991/1 "2023-04-26T18:24:11Z")

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Hi All!

Trying to speed up a build significantly… say the repo has the following structure

```auto
my-project
├── README.md
├── app //app code
├── db //could be ORM or just migrations
└── infra // IaC

```

Is there a way to have Drone, say, skip the app build step if there aren’t any changes in that directory (app takes 11+ minutes to build), skip the db build step if there’s nothing new there, or skip the readme if that’s the only change?

My build is written using a Jsonnet file, so that opens up a few possibilities I think.

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<div class="post-metadata">

### Author: ![allenFisher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ce7236/32.png) [@allenFisher](https://drone.discourse.group/u/allenFisher)
#### Post date: [April 27, 2023, 3:20pm UTC](https://drone.discourse.group/t/creating-a-conditional-build-step-based-on-what-actually-changed/13991/2 "2023-04-27T15:20:03Z")

</div>

I found the paths changed plugin, but it seems you have to run a web service separate from the drone server. This is not possible, I’m not allowed to stand things up willy-nilly on my corporate network, nor do I have direct access to the drone server.