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git-steer

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git-steer

Self-hosting GitHub autonomy engine. A skid steer for your repos.

git-steer gives you 100% autonomous control over your GitHub account through a Model Context Protocol (MCP) server. Manage repos, branches, security, Actions — everything — through natural language. Rate-limit-hardened from the ground up: ETag caching, GraphQL batching, concurrency caps, and chunked execution keep it well inside GitHub's API guardrails at any fleet size.

Philosophy: Zero Footprint

Your machine steers. GitHub does everything else.

Nothing lives locally — no cloned repos, no config files, no build artifacts. git-steer treats your Mac as a thin control plane and GitHub as the entire runtime.

  • Zero local code: No repos cloned, no node_modules, no lock files

  • Keychain only: GitHub App credentials in macOS Keychain — nothing else on disk

  • Git as database: All config, state, and audit logs live in a private GitHub repo

  • Actions as compute: Dependency fixes, linting, and PRs happen in ephemeral cloud runners

  • Rate-limit-hardened: Throttle/retry plugins, ETag caching, GraphQL batching, concurrency caps — safe at any fleet size

┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│                        YOUR MAC                                 │
│                                                                 │
│   Keychain:                                                     │
│     - GitHub App private key                                    │
│     - App ID / Installation ID                                  │
│                                                                 │
│   $ npx git-steer                  (stdio → Claude Desktop)     │
│   $ npx git-steer --http           (portal → localhost:3333)    │
│         │                                                       │
│         ├─► Pulls itself from ry-ops/git-steer                  │
│         ├─► Pulls state from ry-ops/git-steer-state             │
│         ├─► Runs MCP server in-memory (rate-limit-aware)        │
│         └─► Commits state changes back on shutdown              │
│                                                                 │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
                               │
                    Throttled, ETag-cached,
                    GraphQL-batched API calls
                               │
                               ▼
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│                         GITHUB                                  │
│                                                                 │
│   ry-ops/git-steer              (source of truth for code)      │
│   │                                                             │
│   ry-ops/git-steer-state        (private repo)                  │
│   ├── config/                                                   │
│   │   ├── policies.yaml         (branch protection templates)   │
│   │   ├── schedules.yaml        (job definitions)               │
│   │   └── managed-repos.yaml    (what git-steer controls)       │
│   ├── state/                                                    │
│   │   ├── jobs.jsonl            (job history, append-only)      │
│   │   ├── audit.jsonl           (action log + rate telemetry)   │
│   │   ├── rfcs.jsonl            (RFC lifecycle tracking)        │
│   │   ├── quality.jsonl         (linter/SAST results)           │
│   │   └── cache.json            (ETag map + sweep cursor)       │
│   └── .github/workflows/                                        │
│       └── heartbeat.yml         (scheduled triggers)            │
│                                                                 │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

How Code Changes Work

When you ask git-steer to fix security vulnerabilities or make other code changes, it dispatches a GitHub Actions workflow instead of cloning code locally:

┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│  YOUR MAC (MCP triggers intent)                                 │
│                                                                 │
│  Claude: "Fix security vulnerabilities in cortex"               │
│       │                                                         │
│       ▼                                                         │
│  git-steer MCP: security_fix_pr(repo: "cortex", ...)            │
│       │                                                         │
│       └─► Dispatches workflow to GitHub Actions                 │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
                               │
                               ▼
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│  GITHUB ACTIONS (ephemeral compute)                             │
│                                                                 │
│  .github/workflows/security-fix.yml:                            │
│    - Checkout target repo                                       │
│    - Update dependencies                                        │
│    - npm install / uv lock                                      │
│    - Run tests                                                  │
│    - Create branch, commit, push                                │
│    - Open PR                                                    │
│    - Report status back to git-steer-state                      │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

Your Mac stays clean. No node_modules. No Python venvs. No lock files. Just pure orchestration.

Quick Start

# First time setup
npx git-steer init

# This will:
# 1. Create a GitHub App with required permissions
# 2. Install it to your account
# 3. Create a private git-steer-state repo
# 4. Store credentials in macOS Keychain

# Start the MCP server
npx git-steer

Local Footprint

Item

Location

GitHub App ID

macOS Keychain

Installation ID

macOS Keychain

Private Key

macOS Keychain

Claude config

~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json

That's it. No config files. No dotfiles. No ~/.git-steer. No cloned repos.

MCP Tools

Repository Management

  • repo_list - List all accessible repositories

  • repo_create - Create new repo (optionally from template)

  • repo_archive - Archive a repository

  • repo_delete - Permanently delete (requires confirmation)

  • repo_settings - Update repo settings

Branch Operations

  • branch_list - List branches with staleness info (GraphQL-batched)

  • branch_protect - Apply protection rules

  • branch_reap - Delete stale/merged branches (GraphQL-batched)

Security

  • security_scan - Scan repos for vulnerabilities with fix info

  • security_fix_pr - Dispatch workflow to fix vulnerabilities

  • security_alerts - List Dependabot/code scanning alerts

  • security_dismiss - Dismiss alert with reason

  • security_digest - Summary across all managed repos

  • security_enforce - Ensure Dependabot alerts + automated fixes are enabled on all managed repos

Autonomous Security Operations (v0.3.0)

  • security_sweep - Full autonomous pipeline: scan repos, create RFC issues, dispatch fix workflows, track everything — in one call. Supports chunked execution for large fleets and resume across sessions

  • code_quality_sweep - Run linters/SAST (ESLint, Ruff, gosec, Bandit) on repos via GitHub Actions

  • report_generate - Generate compliance reports (executive summary, change records, vulnerability report, full audit)

  • dashboard_generate - Generate an interactive BI-style security dashboard, deployed to GitHub Pages

GitHub Actions

  • actions_workflows - List workflows

  • actions_trigger - Manually trigger a workflow

  • actions_secrets - Manage Actions secrets

  • workflow_status - Check status of dispatched workflows

File Operations

  • repo_commit - Commit files directly via GitHub API (no local clone)

  • repo_read_file - Read a file from a repository (ETag-cached)

  • repo_list_files - List files in a directory

Code Review

  • code_review - Run AI-powered code review using CodeRabbit CLI

Configuration & Observability

  • config_show - Display current config

  • config_add_repo - Add repo to managed list (auto-enables Dependabot)

  • config_remove_repo - Remove from managed list

  • steer_status - Health check with full rate limit budget (all buckets, % remaining, warnings)

  • steer_sync - Force save state to GitHub

  • steer_logs - View audit log with rate limit telemetry

v0.3.0: Rate-Limit Hardened

v0.3.0 is a full API safety overhaul. git-steer now operates conservatively enough to run on large fleets without triggering GitHub's secondary rate limits or abuse detection.

What Changed

┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│  API SAFETY STACK (v0.3.0)                                      │
│                                                                 │
│  Layer 1 — Throttle/Retry plugins                               │
│    Primary rate limit (429)   → auto-retry up to 4×             │
│    Secondary rate limit (403) → always back off + retry         │
│    Transient 5xx / network    → exponential backoff             │
│                                                                 │
│  Layer 2 — Concurrency caps (p-limit)                           │
│    Write ops (issues, PRs, blobs)  → max 2 concurrent           │
│    Read ops (scans, fetches, lists) → max 8 concurrent          │
│    Search API                       → max 1 (serial)            │
│                                                                 │
│  Layer 3 — ETag conditional caching                             │
│    Contents API reads send If-None-Match                        │
│    304 Not Modified → cached content, reduced rate cost         │
│    ETag map persisted to cache.json across restarts             │
│                                                                 │
│  Layer 4 — GraphQL batching                                     │
│    Owner resolution  → viewer { login }  (1 call, not N)        │
│    Branch listing    → refs query        (1 call, not N)        │
│    Dependabot alerts → aliased batch     (1 call, not N)        │
│                                                                 │
│  Layer 5 — Rate budget visibility                               │
│    steer_status shows all buckets + % remaining + warnings      │
│    Refreshed at startup and every 30 minutes                    │
│    Warns if any bucket falls below 15%                          │
│                                                                 │
│  Layer 6 — Audit telemetry                                      │
│    Every audit.jsonl entry carries:                             │
│      rate_remaining, rate_reset,                                │
│      is_secondary_limit_hit, retry_count, backoff_ms            │
│                                                                 │
│  Layer 7 — Chunked sweep + cursor                               │
│    security_sweep(chunkSize: 10) → processes 10 repos           │
│    security_sweep(resume: true)  → continues from cursor        │
│    Cursor persisted to cache.json between sessions              │
│    skipRecentHours → skip repos swept within N hours            │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

security_sweep: Now Fleet-Safe

# Process a large fleet in chunks of 10 — safe on any account size
security_sweep({ severity: "critical", chunkSize: 10 })
→ { hasMore: true, nextIndex: 10, totalRepos: 47, ... }

# Resume from where you left off (cursor persisted to GitHub)
security_sweep({ resume: true })
→ { hasMore: true, nextIndex: 20, totalRepos: 47, ... }

# Skip repos swept in the last 6 hours (polling-fallback)
security_sweep({ skipRecentHours: 6 })

Rate Limit Visibility

steer_status()
→ {
    rateLimit: {
      buckets: {
        core:          { remaining: 4823, limit: 5000, percentRemaining: 96 },
        graphql:       { remaining: 4950, limit: 5000, percentRemaining: 99 },
        search:        { remaining: 28,   limit: 30,   percentRemaining: 93 },
        code_scanning: { remaining: 999,  limit: 1000, percentRemaining: 99 }
      },
      warnings: [],        // populated when any bucket < 15%
      hasWarnings: false
    }
  }

v0.2.0: Autonomous Security Operations

v0.2.0 added a fully autonomous security pipeline replacing manual repo-by-repo CVE sweeps with a single tool call.

Security Sweep Pipeline

security_sweep(severity: "high", repos: ["org/app1", "org/app2"])

What happens:

  1. Scans each repo for Dependabot alerts + CodeQL findings (GraphQL-batched)

  2. Creates ITIL-formatted RFC issues with CVE tables and risk assessments

  3. Dispatches a GitHub Actions workflow that fixes dependencies across all repos in parallel

  4. Workflow creates branches, commits fixes, opens PRs linked to RFC issues

  5. Heartbeat auto-triggers sweeps when new critical alerts appear

Code Quality

code_quality_sweep(owner: "org", repo: "app", tools: ["auto"])

Auto-detects language stack and runs appropriate linters (ESLint, Ruff, Bandit, gosec) via GitHub Actions.

Reports & Dashboard

report_generate(template: "executive-summary")
dashboard_generate()

  • Reports: Executive summaries, change records, vulnerability reports, full audits — as markdown

  • Dashboard: Interactive BI-style security dashboard deployed to GitHub Pages — view it live

Interactive Security Dashboard

A single dashboard_generate() call scans your repos, builds an interactive dashboard, and deploys it to GitHub Pages. Zero dependencies — all data embedded as JSON, rendered client-side with vanilla JS.

Key features:

  • 5 interactive tabs: Overview, CVE Details, Repositories, Code Quality, About

  • Global severity filter: Click CRITICAL/HIGH/MEDIUM/LOW to filter across all tabs

  • Sortable tables: Click any column header to sort asc/desc

  • Live search: Filter CVE and quality tables by typing

  • Expandable repo cards: Click to drill into per-repo vulnerability details

  • Hover tooltips: Hover metric cards to see what each metric means

  • Run Security Scan: Trigger a workflow dispatch from the dashboard (requires PAT)

  • CSV export: Download current tab data as CSV (respects active filters)

  • Click-to-copy CVE IDs: Click any CVE link to copy to clipboard

  • Keyboard shortcuts: 1-5 switch tabs, Esc close modals, ? show hints

  • Fullscreen mode: Toggle fullscreen from the header

  • NVD links: Every CVE ID links directly to the NVD detail page

Daily Automated Pipeline

The full pipeline runs daily via the Heartbeat GitHub Actions workflow:

┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│  GITHUB ACTIONS (daily at 6 AM UTC)                             │
│                                                                 │
│  Heartbeat workflow:                                            │
│    1. Enforce Dependabot on all managed repos                   │
│    2. Scan all repos for Dependabot alerts                      │
│    3. Auto-trigger security sweep for critical alerts           │
│    4. Follow up on security PRs (merged/stale/conflict)         │
│    5. Regenerate dashboard from fresh data                      │
│    6. Sync changelog entries to blog                            │
│    7. Log heartbeat status (always, even on failure)            │
│                                                                 │
│  No local machine needed. Everything runs in the cloud.         │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

PR Lifecycle Tracking

Security PRs are tracked to completion automatically. The follow-up step:

  • Merged PRs: marks RFC as fixed, computes MTTR, closes the RFC issue

  • Stale PRs (>48h): nudges reviewers with a comment, adds stale label

  • Merge conflicts: flags with a comment and merge-conflict label

  • Closed without merge: resets RFC to open (fix failed, retry needed)

  • Orphan scan: catches security PRs not linked to any RFC

Changelog Pipeline

Merged PRs across all managed repos are automatically turned into changelog entries and committed to the blog repo. The pipeline classifies PRs (feature/fix/improvement), generates frontmatter, and deduplicates by filename.

Example Usage

You: "List all my repos"
Claude: [calls repo_list]

You: "Scan all my repos for security vulnerabilities"
Claude: [calls security_scan with repo="*"]

You: "Fix the critical vulnerabilities in cortex"
Claude: [calls security_fix_pr - dispatches workflow to GitHub Actions]

You: "Check the status of the fix"
Claude: [calls workflow_status]

You: "Run a security sweep across all managed repos, 10 at a time"
Claude: [calls security_sweep with chunkSize=10, then resumes until done]

You: "What's my API rate limit headroom?"
Claude: [calls steer_status - shows all buckets with % remaining]

You: "Delete all branches older than 60 days in mcp-unifi, except main"
Claude: [calls branch_reap with daysStale=60, exclude=['main']]

You: "Archive my old-project repo"
Claude: [calls repo_archive]

Claude Desktop Integration

Add to ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "git-steer": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["git-steer"]
    }
  }
}

Or use a local checkout:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "git-steer": {
      "command": "node",
      "args": ["/path/to/git-steer/bin/cli.js", "start", "--stdio"]
    }
  }
}

GitHub App Permissions Required

The git-steer GitHub App needs these permissions:

  • Repository: Read & Write (contents, metadata)

  • Pull Requests: Read & Write

  • Issues: Read & Write (for RFC tracking)

  • Actions: Read & Write (for workflow dispatch)

  • Dependabot alerts: Read & Write (for enabling vulnerability alerts)

  • Code scanning alerts: Read (for CodeQL integration)

  • Secrets: Read & Write (for Actions secrets)

  • Administration: Read & Write (for repo settings)

  • Pages: Read & Write (for dashboard deployment)

Setting Up Secrets

For the security-fix workflow to authenticate to target repos, add these secrets to the git-steer repo:

  1. GIT_STEER_APP_ID - Your GitHub App ID

  2. GIT_STEER_PRIVATE_KEY - Your GitHub App private key

These allow the workflow to generate installation tokens for any repo in your installation.

Local Portal

git-steer includes an HTTP/SSE transport mode that exposes the MCP server as a local web portal:

# Start portal on default port 3333
git-steer start --http

# Custom port
git-steer start --http --port 8080
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│  LOCAL PORTAL  →  http://localhost:3333                         │
│                                                                 │
│  /dashboard   Live security dashboard (rendered from state)     │
│  /mcp         Streamable HTTP MCP endpoint (protocol 2025-11)   │
│  /sse         Legacy SSE MCP endpoint    (protocol 2024-11)     │
│  /messages    Legacy POST endpoint for SSE clients              │
│  /health      JSON status + active session count                │
│                                                                 │
│  Use cases:                                                     │
│    - View the security dashboard without deploying to Pages     │
│    - Connect any MCP-compatible client (not just Claude)        │
│    - Run git-steer headless on a server or NAS                  │
│    - Script against the MCP API directly                        │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

The portal uses the same Keychain credentials, same state repo, and same rate-limit-hardened API stack as stdio mode. The dashboard at /dashboard renders live from in-memory state on every request — no GitHub Pages deployment needed.

Commands

git-steer init                       # First-time setup
git-steer                            # Start MCP server via stdio (Claude Desktop)
git-steer start --http               # Start local portal on port 3333
git-steer start --http --port 8080   # Start portal on custom port
git-steer scan                       # Run security scan across all repos
git-steer scan --repo owner/name     # Scan a specific repo
git-steer scan --severity critical   # Filter by severity
git-steer status                     # Show status + rate limit budget
git-steer sync                       # Force sync state to GitHub
git-steer reset                      # Remove local credentials

Release History

Version

Highlights

v0.3.0

Rate-limit hardening: throttle/retry plugins, p-limit concurrency caps, ETag caching, GraphQL batching, chunked sweep with cursor, full audit telemetry

v0.2.0

Autonomous security pipeline: sweep → RFC → fix PR → track MTTR. Dashboard, reports, code quality sweep

v0.1.0

Manual security ops, branch management, repo settings, MCP server core

npx git-steer@0.3   # v0.3.x (rate-limit hardened)
npx git-steer@0.2   # v0.2.x (autonomous security ops)
npx git-steer@0.1   # v0.1.x (manual security ops)
npx git-steer       # latest

Offline Behavior

When offline, git-steer runs in read-only mode with cached state. Write operations queue until next online session. ETag cache remains valid across offline periods.

Security

  • All GitHub API access through a dedicated GitHub App (not your personal token)

  • Credentials stored in macOS Keychain (syncs via iCloud Keychain if enabled)

  • Full audit log of all actions with rate limit telemetry in state repo

  • No secrets in code or config files

  • No code stored locally — everything ephemeral

  • SSH commit signing enforced on main branch

License

MIT

Built by ry-ops

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