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GitHub Actions: What Credentials Are Required to Pull Image from GitHub Packages to Local Environment?

Learn the specific credentials needed to authenticate and pull container images from GitHub Packages to your local development environment.

Table of Contents

Question

When pulling an image to your local environment, which credentials are needed?

A. Your GitHub username and a Personal Access Token
B. The name of the organization and an API Key
C. The name of the package and a package key

GitHub Packages use your GitHub identity to authenticate you.

Answer

A. Your GitHub username and a Personal Access Token

Explanation

When pulling a container image from GitHub Packages to your local environment, you need to provide your GitHub username and a Personal Access Token (PAT) for authentication.

GitHub Packages uses your GitHub identity to authenticate you when interacting with the package registry. Your regular GitHub username serves to identify you, while a PAT generated from your GitHub account settings acts as the password to authorize access.

You must create a PAT with the appropriate scope that includes read access for packages. When pulling an image, you will use your GitHub username and this PAT in place of your regular password.

For example, to pull an image with Docker after logging in to the GitHub container registry, the command would look like:

$ docker pull ghcr.io/OWNER/IMAGE_NAME

During this process, Docker will prompt you to enter your GitHub username and PAT to authenticate the connection before it can pull the image to your local machine.

So in summary, the credentials required are specifically your personal GitHub username to identify you and a GitHub Personal Access Token to authorize access, not an organization name, API key, package name or package key.

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