How Can I Manage Pipeline Schedules Without User Dependency in GitLab?

One simple solution is to request a Technical Account and set up the pipelines under that account. It could save you from running into issues when someone leaves the company.

From what I've gathered, all scheduled pipelines are tied to jobs. You might consider just recreating them under a new user. I haven't been working with GitLab for long, but that's one approach.

You can create an access token and use it to set up the pipeline schedule via the API. Unlike user accounts, access tokens don’t have owners, so you only have to renew them once a year without having to recreate the schedules. Plus, with the API setup, you can manage your configurations as code, making it easier to handle.

While pipelines may break when a user leaves, you can easily adopt those scheduled pipelines. GitLab has documentation on how to take ownership of existing scheduled pipelines. It's a straightforward process to gain control over them again.

It’s definitely possible to use a bot user to run the pipelines. That’s what I’m currently doing! If you're interested, I can explain how I set mine up.