Pomerium

# GitHub

This document describes the use of GitHub as an identity provider for Pomerium.

Before we proceed, please be aware that GitHub API (opens new window) does not support OpenID Connect (opens new window), just OAuth 2.0 (opens new window). For this reason, it was challenging to implement revocation of a user's Access Token (a string representing the granted permissions) when they sign out from Pomerium's user info endpoint.

In addition, the teams of the organization(s) a user belongs to, will be used as groups on Pomerium.

# Setting up GitHub OAuth 2.0 for your Application

  1. Log in to Github (opens new window) or create an account.

  2. Navigate to your profile using the avatar on the navigation bar.

  3. Go to your settings.

GitHub settings

  1. Click the Developers settings and create a new OAuth Application.

GitHub OAuth2 Application creation

  1. Create a new OAuth2 application by filling the form fields above with the following parameters:
Field Description
Application name The name of your web app
Homepage URL The homepage URL of the application to be integrated with Pomerium
Authorization callback URL https://${authenticate_service_url}/oauth2/callback, authenticate_service_url from pomerium configuration

After the application had been created, you will have access to the credentials, the Client ID and Client Secret.

# Service Account

To use allowed_groups in a policy an idp_service_account needs to be set in the Pomerium configuration. The Service Account for GitHub should be a personal access token with read:org permissions, which can be created at github.com/settings/tokens/new (opens new window).

Personal Access Token

The format of the idp_service_account for GitHub is a base64-encoded JSON document:

{
  "username": "YOUR_GITHUB_USERNAME",
  "personal_access_token": "GENERATED_GITHUB_ACCESS_TOKEN"
}

# Pomerium Configuration

After creating your GitHub OAuth application, you can create your Pomerium configuration like the example below:

authenticate_service_url: https://authenticate.localhost.pomerium.io
idp_provider: "github"
idp_client_id: "REDACTED"   // github application ID
idp_client_secret: "REDACTED"   // github application secret
idp_service_account: "REDACTED" // github service account (personal access token)

Whenever a user tries to access your application integrated with Pomerium, they will be presented with a sign-on page as below:

GitHub Sign-on Page

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