Slack: Subscribe to a public repository

[saveman71]

I tried to subscribe to an external dependency I use, which I'd like to follow closely for a few weeks until a particular bug is resolved.

I cannot figure out if this is supposed to be supported or not, as I get an error message asking me to add the app, which I did, to my account, assuming that it would use a token related to my account to pull the info from that particular public repo.

However, even after connecting my account, I still get the 'Unauthorized' error message.

[bkeepers]

Hi @saveman71, thanks for opening an issue.

You can only subscribe to a repository if the owner of that repository has installed the Slack app on GitHub, which sends GitHub activity to Slack. Installing the app on your own account will only send activity from repositories you own.

This constraint is inherent in the design of GitHub Apps, so I don't see it changing in the foreseeable future. I know that's a bummer for this use case of subscribing to activity on open source projects you use.

Do you think you could ask the repository owner to install the app?

[saveman71]

No, I have absolutely no relations to that repository, it's just a dependency as any (e.g. angularjs). Thanks for answering my question. I figured this could work as the "watch" button in some way. I'll find another way!