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Warning

Migrations are coming to VA GitHub. See the Migrations section for more information.

GHEC-US Limitations

Limitations of the GHEC-US Environment

For the most part GHEC-US is the same GitHub Enterprise Cloud product that VA has been using for some time, however there are a few features that are currently unavailable. The following unavailable features will have the most impact on the VA’s migrations to GHEC-US:

  • Maven Packages
  • App Marketplace and App Limitations
  • Codespaces
  • MacOS Actions Runners
  • Copilot Metrics API

Maven Packages

Maven packages are not supported in GHEC-US. The tentative plan is to use the VA’s existing Nexus server instead of GitHub Packages for maven artifacts. We are working with the VA to expose Nexus to the internet, so that VA teams can use Nexus in both local development workflows and GitHub Actions. VA teams will need to transition all maven projects and CICD workflows to use Nexus instead of GitHub Packages for retrieving and publishing maven artifacts.

App Marketplace and App Limitations

GitHub Apps are fully supported in GHEC-US however the Marketplace is not available so GitHub Apps need to be installed and configured manually. Apps may also be incompatible with GHEC-US if they cannot be configured to send API requests to a custom hostname, or if they are dependent upon features or API behaviors that are not available in GHEC-US. The VA’s GHEC-US instance will have its own custom hostname va.ghe.com instead of github.com, and API requests will need to be sent to api.va.ghe.com instead of api.github.com. If any GitHub Apps are hardcoded to send requests to api.github.com and cannot be configured to use api.va.ghe.com instead, then those apps will be incompatible with GHEC-US until the code is updated (for VA custom apps) or the vendor provides an update (for third-party apps).

The GitHub team is already working with VA to install the Slack and Jira apps that are installed in all repositories in GHEC. If VA teams are using mission critical third-party GitHub Apps and are concerned about the impact of potential incompatibilities with GHEC-US then we recommend to create a support request and provide the details such as which Apps are being used and which repositories they are installed in, and we will help determine whether those Apps are compatible.

However VA teams should also note that since GHEC-US will be a fully FedRAMP Moderate system, VA must scrutinize all requests to install third party apps (or any custom app that attempts to send data to an external service) since these apps now represent interconnects between VA systems. We are still working with VA to establish a process to request new third party apps but at the bare minimum VA teams will need to ensure the external system has an ATO and submit an MOU to document the interconnect between GitHub and the external system.

Codespaces

Codespaces is not yet available in GHEC-US but will be available at a future date. Users and repositories using Codespaces can work with VA leadership to delay their migrations until Codespaces is available.

MacOS Actions Runners

GitHub-hosted macOS Actions runners are not yet available in GHEC-US but will be available at a future date. We are working closely with the va-mobile-app team which is the main user of macOS runners at VA. Any other teams or repositories using macOS runners may be able to convert their workflows to Linux runners. Create a support request for consultation if desired.

Copilot Metrics API

The Copilot Metrics API is not yet available in GHEC-US but will be available at a future date.