Troubleshooting GitHub Actions: Overcoming Access Issues When Committing Changes

Are you working on automating your website updates with GitHub Actions but running into permission barriers? You’re not alone. Many developers, especially those new to web development, encounter roadblocks when attempting to push changes back to their repositories through automation scripts.

Understanding the Challenge

In this scenario, a developer has crafted a scraper that extracts data from a separate calendar source and stores it as a JSON file. The goal is to have a static website dynamically display this data by updating the JSON file. To keep everything automated, they’ve set up a GitHub Actions workflow that runs the scraper and attempts to commit the updated JSON back to the repository.

However, every attempt to push changes results in a permission error indicating that the workflow’s bot does not have the necessary access rights. Despite configuring tokens and permissions, the error persists, leaving the developer puzzled and frustrated.

Common Causes and Solutions

1. Verify Token Permissions:
   Ensure the personal access token (PAT) used by GitHub Actions has the repo scope enabled, granting full control over private and public repositories. Without this, push operations will be denied.

2. Use the Correct Repository Secrets:
   Store your PAT securely in GitHub Secrets (e.g., GITHUB_TOKEN or a custom token) and reference it properly within your workflow. Double-check that the secret name in your YAML matches what you’re referencing in your scripts.

3. Properly Configure Git with Authentication:
   When scripting in your workflow, you need to authenticate Git operations. Typically, this involves setting your remote URL to include the token, like:
   git remote set-url origin https://<TOKEN>@github.com/username/repository.git
   Or configuring credentials via git config or environment variables.

4. Use the Built-In GitHub Token:
   GitHub automatically provides a special GITHUB_TOKEN secret in workflows that can be used to authenticate. Ensure you’re using this token and that it has the necessary permissions.

5. Check Repository Settings and Permissions:
   If the repository belongs to an organization or has branch protection rules, verify that the token isn’t blocked by such policies.

Example Workflow Snippet

Here’s how a typical GitHub Actions step for committing changes might look:

“`yaml
– name: Commit and push changes
run: |
git config –global user