Private Repos

Authenticate with GitHub or GitLab to clone private repositories.

By default, the egg clones public repositories without any credentials. To access a private repository, you need a personal access token. The egg injects it into the Git URL at startup — you never embed credentials in the URL yourself.

Never put your access token directly in the GIT_URL field. The egg handles credential injection automatically.

1. Generate a personal access token

   GitHub

   1. Go to GitHub Settings → Tokens.
   2. Click Generate new token and select Classic.
   3. Give the token a name and check the repo scope.
   4. Click Generate token and copy the value — you won’t see it again.

   GitLab

   1. Go to User Settings → Access Tokens in your GitLab instance.
   2. Create a new token with the read_repository scope.
   3. Copy the token value before leaving the page.
2. Set your username in the panel

   In your server’s startup variables, set USERNAME to your GitHub or GitLab username (the same account that owns the repository).

3. Set your access token in the panel

   Set ACCESS_TOKEN to the token you generated in step 1.

4. Set the repository URL

   Set GIT_URL to the plain HTTPS URL of your repository — do not embed credentials in the URL.

   Correct

   https://github.com/user/repo
   

   Incorrect — do not do this

   https://user:[e-mail]/user/repo
   

   The egg constructs the authenticated URL internally using USERNAME and ACCESS_TOKEN.

5. Start the server

   Start (or restart) the server. The egg injects your credentials into the Git URL automatically before cloning or pulling.

Tokens with the repo scope can access all your repositories. Create a fine-grained token with access only to the specific repo for better security.