GitHub OAuth2.0 access for web application

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GitHub is one of the most popular platforms for developers. Millions of developers and companies build, ship, and maintain their software on GitHub. Their platform allows third party websites to use GitHub as registration or login option with just a few clicks. That is the social login and it allows customers to bring their existing social identities and use them to register and log in without creating a new account explicitly. It saves a lot of time for users and makes the life easier as we don't need to remember all those credentials for different websites anymore.

Prerequisites

GitHub can be very popular sign in option but it's still an option. There are many alternatives and all of them can work together. We recommend you to read about OAuth 2.0 protocol and how it works. We have a detailed post about it here: understanding OAuth 2.0 and how it works.

You will need a GitHub account to generate a client id and a client secret. If you don't have an account, create one from here: GitHub SignUp.

Configuring GitHub APP

Navigate to your profile settings. On the left side, in Developer settings section, you will find OAuth Apps option to register your applications:

oauth_github_menu.png

If you don't have any, you will see the following screen with an option to register it:oauth_github_no_app.png

There will be a simple form to fill asking some basic data about your application.

Credentials

You will be asked to provide some information about your app and authorization callback URL. This URL will be used by GitHub to send back the authorization data to your application.

oauth_github_registration.png

Once registered with basic information you will have assigned a client ID. You must manually generate a Client Secret using the button available in your application settings view. Copy and save it in a secure place as you won’t be able to see it again.

Note: on the same screen, you have an option to upload a logo for your application.

Configuring your application

The web application flow to authorize users for your app is:

  • Users are redirected to request their GitHub identity

  • Users are redirected back to your site by GitHub

  • Your app accesses the API with the user's access token

Request a user's GitHub identity

Your first step is to create the authorization request. That request sets parameters that identify your application and define the permissions that the user will be asked to grant to your application.

GitHub's OAuth 2.0 endpoint is at:

https://github.com/login/oauth/authorize

When your GitHub App specifies a login parameter, it prompts users with a specific account they can use for signing in and authorizing your app.

Name

Type

Description

client_id

Required

The client ID you received from GitHub when you registered your application.

login

Optional

Suggests a specific account to use for signing in and authorizing the app.

scope

Optional

A space-delimited list of scopes. If not provided, scope defaults to an empty list for users that have not authorized any scopes for the application. For users who have authorized scopes for the application, the user won't be shown the OAuth authorization page with the list of scopes. Instead, this step of the flow will automatically complete with the set of scopes the user has authorized for the application.
Find more detailed information of available scope on the official documentation.

state

Optional

An unguessable random string. It is used to protect against cross-site request forgery attacks.

allow_signup

Optional

Whether or not unauthenticated users will be offered an option to sign up for GitHub during the OAuth flow. The default is true. Use false when a policy prohibits signups.

Users are redirected back to your site by GitHub

If the user accepts your request, GitHub redirects back to your site with a temporary code in a code parameter as well as the state you provided in the previous step in a state parameter. The temporary code will expire after 10 minutes.

Exchange this code for an access token making a POST request to the URL below:

https://github.com/login/oauth/access_token

and set the following parameters:

Name

Type

Description

client_id

Required

The client ID you received from GitHub for your OAuth App.

client_secret

Required

The client secret you received from GitHub for your OAuth App.

code

Required

The code you received as a response from the initial request.

redirect_uri

Optional

The URL in your application where users are sent after authorization. If the application specifies a localhost URL and a port, then after authorizing the application users will be redirected to the provided URL and port.

By default, the response takes the following form:

Name

Description

access_token

The token that your application sends to authorize a GitHub API request.

scope

The scopes of access granted by the access_token expressed as a list of space-delimited, case-sensitive strings.

token_type

The type of token returned. At this time, this field's value is always set to Bearer.

Response may be provided in different formats depending on Accept header. For example:

Accept: application/json

or

Accept: application/xml

Use the access token to access the API

The access token allows you to make requests to the API on a behalf of a user. Use the following endpoint:

https://api.github.com/user

providing the access token generated in the previous step in the Authorization header:

Authorization: token access_token

Depending on the selected scope you will have more or less information about the user.

Conclusion

We've described and learned how the complete OAuth 2.0 flow works with GitHub. It's easy and quite forward. You can have your application within minutes and test GitHub responses by yourself.

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