ci(e2e): Playwright e2e job hangs indefinitely on 'Install Playwright browsers'

[matthias476]

Symptom

The e2e job in ci.yml hangs on the "Install Playwright browsers" step and never completes — observed ~20+ minutes (vs. a normal full e2e run of ~2.5 min). Reproduced across a fresh runner re-run on the same PR, so it is not a one-off runner flake. ci (lint/test/build) passes in <1 min throughout.

Observed on PR #129 (run 26631536021): both the original run and the re-run sat on "Install Playwright browsers" indefinitely; the job had to be cancelled to unblock the merge.

Impact

• e2e effectively never finishes → blocks the normal "wait for CI before merge" workflow.
• fix(network-policies): grant CNPG instances egress to API server (#128) #129 had to be merged via --admin on the passing ci check (the change was infra-YAML-only, unrelated to e2e).

Likely causes to investigate

• Playwright browser download hanging on GitHub runners (CDN/network), or a Playwright version bump that changed the install behavior.
• Missing/!cold browser cache between runs (no ~/.cache/ms-playwright caching step?).
• A step lacking a timeout, so a stalled download hangs the whole job instead of failing fast.

Suggested fixes

• Add a timeout-minutes to the e2e job (and/or the install step) so a stalled install fails fast instead of hanging.
• Cache Playwright browsers (actions/cache on ~/.cache/ms-playwright keyed by the Playwright version) to avoid re-downloading every run.
• Pin/verify the Playwright version; consider npx playwright install --with-deps <only-needed-browser>.
• Confirm whether e2e should even run on infra/chart-only diffs (nx affected scoping).

Acceptance

• e2e completes (pass or fail) in a bounded time (e.g. <8 min) and cannot hang indefinitely.
• A stalled browser install fails the step with a clear error rather than hanging.