GitHub Copilot Contributing Guidelines

This skill enforces repository contribution guidelines, commit conventions, CI/CD best practices, and development environment requirements for GitHub Actions projects.

What This Skill Does

Guides GitHub Copilot to:

Instructions

1. Always Read Contributing Guidelines

Before making any changes:

- Git and PR conventions

- Code abstraction and DRY principles

- Documentation standards

- Planning and scope guidelines

- Shell/Bash conventions

- Project-specific rules

2. Commit and PR Conventions

**REQUIRED FORMAT**: Follow [Conventional Commits](https://www.conventionalcommits.org/) specification for:

Examples:

3. CI Checks - CRITICAL Requirement

**MANDATORY WORKFLOW**: Always run CI checks locally before committing

1. **Identify the checks**: Review the corresponding CI workflow file to understand what checks will run

2. **Run checks locally**: Execute the same checks that CI will perform

3. **Verify all pass**: Ensure 100% of checks pass with no errors

4. **Only then commit**: Commit only after all local checks succeed

**Why this matters**: CI failures waste time and resources. Local validation is mandatory, not optional.

**Example workflow** for `.github/actions/lysbot-merge/`:

```bash

cd .github/actions/lysbot-merge

npm ci # Install dependencies from package-lock.json

Make your code changes...

npm run all # Run all fix, check, and package steps

Commit ONLY if the above passes without errors

```

4. Configuration File Extensions - DO NOT CHANGE

**CRITICAL**: The following configuration files in `.github/actions/lysbot-merge/` MUST maintain their `.mjs` extension:

**DO NOT change to**: `.ts`, `.js`, or `.cjs`

**Reason**: These ES module files use `.mjs` to ensure GitHub Copilot compatibility. The project previously used `.ts` files which caused Copilot compatibility issues. Changing extensions will break configuration loading and cause CI failures.

5. Node.js Version Requirements

Development for `.github/actions/lysbot-merge/` should use Node.js versions matching the production runtime:

**Node.js 24.x (REQUIRED / STANDARD)**:

**Node.js 22.x (NOT RECOMMENDED / FALLBACK ONLY)**:

**Node.js 20.x (STRONGLY DISCOURAGED / UNSUPPORTED)**:

6. Development Environment Setup

**Standard approach (Node.js 24.x)**:

1. Use Node.js 24.x to match production runtime

2. All npm scripts work without additional configuration

3. No environment variable workarounds needed

4. Ensures consistency with CI and production

**If using Node.js 22.x (not recommended)**:

1. Be aware this does not match production runtime

2. All tooling works with `.mjs` configuration files

3. Upgrade to Node.js 24.x as soon as possible

4. Test thoroughly as runtime behavior may differ

**If on Node.js 20.x**:

1. **Strongly recommended**: Upgrade to Node.js 24.x immediately

2. No guarantee of continued compatibility

3. Significant version gap may cause unexpected issues

Key Reminders

Example Usage

When modifying GitHub Actions code:

1. Review `CONTRIBUTING.md` and `.cursor/rules`

2. Make code changes

3. Run `npm ci` to install exact dependencies

4. Run `npm run all` to execute all checks

5. Verify all checks pass

6. Create commit with Conventional Commits format: `feat: add new feature`

7. Create PR with Conventional Commits title: `feat: add new feature`

Constraints