github-auth

GitHub Authentication Setup

This skill sets up authentication so the agent can work with GitHub repositories, PRs, issues, and CI. It covers two paths:

• git (always available) — uses HTTPS personal access tokens or SSH keys
• gh CLI (if installed) — richer GitHub API access with a simpler auth flow

Detection Flow

When a user asks you to work with GitHub, run this check first:

# Check what's available
git --version
gh --version 2>/dev/null || echo "gh not installed"

# Check if already authenticated
gh auth status 2>/dev/null || echo "gh not authenticated"
git config --global credential.helper 2>/dev/null || echo "no git credential helper"

Decision tree:

1. If gh auth status shows authenticated → you're good, use gh for everything
2. If gh is installed but not authenticated → use "gh auth" method below
3. If gh is not installed → use "git-only" method below (no sudo needed)

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Method 1: Git-Only Authentication (No gh, No sudo)

This works on any machine with git installed. No root access needed.

Option A: HTTPS with Personal Access Token (Recommended)

This is the most portable method — works everywhere, no SSH config needed.

Step 1: Create a personal access token

Tell the user to go to: https://github.com/settings/tokens

• Click "Generate new token (classic)"
• Give it a name like "hermes-agent"
• Select scopes:
  • repo (full repository access — read, write, push, PRs)
  • workflow (trigger and manage GitHub Actions)
  • read:org (if working with organization repos)
• Set expiration (90 days is a good default)
• Copy the token — it won't be shown again

Step 2: Configure git to store the token

# Set up the credential helper to cache credentials
# "store" saves to ~/.git-credentials in plaintext (simple, persistent)
git config --global credential.helper store

# Now do a test operation that triggers auth — git will prompt for credentials
# Username: <their-github-username>
# Password: <paste the personal access token, NOT their GitHub password>
git ls-remote https://github.com/<their-username>/<any-repo>.git