GitHub
Connecting your source code to Unblocked
Running your own enterprise server? Go take a look at the GitHub Enterprise documentation instead. If you are using GitHub Enterprise Cloud or GitHub.com, this is how you can get started.
Unblocked exists to answer questions about your application, so it leverages your codebase as a primary source for explaining how your application works. When you connect Unblocked with your GitHub organization, you enable a critical data source for answers. You’ll get a few extra, first-class features too:
- Unblocked refreshes your team’s data index as you make changes to your codebase. This means that answers to questions will reflect the latest updates to your codebase, while also taking into account your code’s history.
- Any relevant Pull Requests or Issues will also be referenced throughout Unblocked alongside the discussions you or your teammates have with Unblocked. As your team works on parts of your codebase, Unblocked provides notifications for quick access to Pull Request discussions that people are participating in. This is specifically something you’ll notice in the Mac app or in the IDE extensions.
Connect your organization and repositories
You need to be a GitHub organization owner to install the Unblocked GitHub App into your GitHub organization.
Sign in to Unblocked
Whether you sign in with GitHub credentials, another code repository, or your SSO provider, you first need to authenticate to Unblocked.
Authorize the Unblocked app
If you aren’t logged into GitHub, you’ll be prompted to do so.
Once you’re authenticated to GitHub, you’ll be asked to grant some basic permissions to Unblocked. This does not install Unblocked on your GitHub account, but rather sets up a user account on Unblocked. If you’ve already logged in to Unblocked, you will not need to do this.
Connect your repositories
Once you’ve given access to your GitHub account, Unblocked still needs to know which repositories you want it to answer questions about. After clicking Grant Access in GitHub, you’ll be redirected back to GitHub, where you’ll be prompted to select the organization or account you want to install Unblocked into. While you can install Unblocked on any GitHub account or organization, Unblocked works best with your work organization and repositories.
If your GitHub organization has multiple repositories, you have the option to select the repositories shared with Unblocked. For ease of configuration in the future, we recommend sharing all repositories with Unblocked, but you can provide a narrower scope if necessary.
Unblocked preselects the repositories that have been active in the last 6 months. Forked and archived repositories are not preselected.
Generating a model for answering questions
Unblocked is able to answer questions for the repositories that it has ingested into its model. After giving Unblocked initial access to your repositories, you’ll then choose which ones it should ingest. You can also select whether all new repositories should be automatically ingested into your Unblocked model.
Once you select the repositories you want to ask questions about, click Save Settings, and Unblocked will get to work. If your repositories have a lot of code, documentation, and discussions, then data ingestion may take longer to process. However, Unblocked will keep you updated as it builds an understanding of your codebase and documentation.
Once Unblocked has fully processed the information associated with your GitHub repositories, you can start asking questions. Unblocked’s responses include information from your code as well as discussions you’ve had with your teammates about it.
Managing connected repositories
If you decide at a later time that you want to adjust the repositories that Unblocked can access, you can always add or remove connected sources. First, select the Data Sources in your sidebar and then select GitHub.
In this view, you’ll be able to select or unselect any repository that Unblocked has access to. If there is a repository you expect to see in the list but isn’t showing, click the GitHub repositories link. This will take you to the settings for the Unblocked GitHub application.
From this page you can adjust the repository access settings to include all repositories on this GitHub account or organization, or select specific repositories.
Once you save these settings, you can return to the Unblocked web interface and select the repositories you wish to include in your Unblocked instance.
Continuing Set Up
While it is certainly possible to use Unblocked without incorporating any further data sources, we strongly encourage you to include as many other systems in which you have documented or even discussed your applications. If you’re using Unblocked’s Enterprise plan, you can also connect other source code management systems to your Unblocked workspace.
If you have restricted network access to your repositories, you may need to allow Unblocked’s IP address ranges.