Idea: Enabling GitHub collaboration, automation, and AI interaction via SMS text messages.
Status: pre-1.0 community fork of github/git-sms. Not a GitHub product. Provided as-is under the MIT license. Read SECURITY.md before you deploy it.
Text a phone number, work on GitHub:
you > use acme/field-reports
git > Default repo is now acme/field-reports. Try ISSUES or ISSUE #1.
you > new issue Pump 3 leaks -- Water on the floor near pump 3 since 6am
git > Reply CONFIRM 4821 within 10 min to open an issue in acme/field-reports: "Pump 3 leaks". ABORT drops it.
you > confirm 4821
git > Created acme/field-reports#57: https://github.com/acme/field-reports/issues/57
| Command | What it does |
|---|---|
COMMANDS, COMMANDS <name> |
List commands, or explain one |
USE owner/repo |
Set a default repository, so #12 works on its own |
REPO [owner/repo] |
Description, stars, open work, language, link |
ISSUES [owner/repo] [open|closed|all] |
Recent issues (pull requests excluded) |
ISSUE owner/repo#12 |
One issue: state, author, labels, excerpt, link |
PRS [owner/repo], PR owner/repo#5 |
Open pull requests; one pull request with branch, size and mergeability |
SEARCH words |
Find repositories you may read |
SUMMARIZE owner/repo, SUMMARIZE owner/repo#12 |
AI summary of a README or a whole issue/PR thread (optional) |
NEW ISSUE [owner/repo] Title -- details |
Open an issue (asks for confirmation) |
COMMENT owner/repo#12 text |
Comment on an issue or pull request (asks for confirmation) |
CLOSE / REOPEN owner/repo#12 |
Change an issue's state (asks for confirmation; pull requests stay on GitHub) |
CONFIRM 1234, ABORT |
Approve or drop the waiting change |
MORE, WHOAMI |
Next page of a long reply; your alias and access |
Free-form messages ("what's broken in field reports?") are optionally rewritten into one of these commands by a language model, and the reply shows how it was understood. A model can never run anything outside this grammar, and anything that changes GitHub always needs the confirmation code.
Command words avoid the carrier keywords (HELP, INFO, STOP, CANCEL, END, QUIT, YES, START...).
With Twilio's default opt-out handling, HELP and INFO are answered by Twilio and never forwarded, so the
original help command could not reach the prototype; COMMANDS replaces it. With Advanced Opt-Out, Twilio
forwards those keywords flagged with OptOutType: Git SMS records the opt-out state and stays silent, so nobody
gets two replies.
Every message passes, in order: a valid Twilio signature for the exact public URL; a durable, one-time intake (the message is committed to the queue before Twilio is answered, and redelivery is a no-op); opt-out state; an operator-owned sender directory (unknown numbers get silence); per-sender and global rate and spend limits; explicit repository grants (search results included); and, for any write, a confirmation code that only the registered handset receives, which production cannot switch off. That last step also defeats a spoofed sender number.
Every write is durably recorded in the same step that accepts its confirmation, so a crash cannot silently discard an approval, and it is attempted at most once, so nothing is ever written twice. Approval is not a promise of execution: GitHub may refuse the change, access may have been revoked, or an attempt interrupted by a crash ends as unknown rather than being repeated. New issues and comments carry a hidden marker that proves later whether they landed. A write GitHub did not confirm is reported as unconfirmed and never retried blindly. Writes run under a least-privilege GitHub App installation token (or a fine-grained token) and are attributed to the sender's alias, not their number. Queued messages, replies and pending changes are encrypted at rest and expire; senders are stored as keyed hashes; every decision is audited. Details: SECURITY.md and docs/ARCHITECTURE.md.
See SETUP.md: about 15 minutes with a Twilio number, a GitHub App (or token) and any host that can serve HTTPS. A Dockerfile is included.
Status: development foundation (0.2). Carrier-delivered SMS has now been tested in both directions over two transports (an Android handset as the SMS gateway, and a Twilio number), with a live AI provider, against a real GitHub repository. Not yet tested: Twilio calling Git SMS's own webhook with a carrier message (it needs a dedicated, registered number) and a real GitHub App installation. See docs/TESTING.md.
- Done (0.2): authenticated webhook edge with a durable queue and crash recovery, sender directory and grants, confirmed issue/comment/close/reopen with a write journal, deterministic read commands, SMS-aware paging, delivery-status tracking, retention, optional AI summaries and natural-language routing under a daily budget, an audit log, operator commands and a readiness probe, 346 automated tests, and live end-to-end, crash-recovery, carrier-SMS and AI harnesses.
- Next: a dedicated Twilio number with A2P 10DLC or toll-free registration so the webhook leg runs on carrier traffic; a real least-privilege GitHub App (including whether pull-request comments need more than Issues permission); then a GitHub App setup helper, an audit export command, optional per-user PINs.
- Then: allowlisted
workflow_dispatch(RUN deploy staging) with run tracking, SMS notifications for watched issues, and an optional Android SMS-gateway transport for deployments without an SMS provider.
The full plan and its reasoning are in docs/ARCHITECTURE.md.
Git SMS is an open source project that shows a proof of concept to enable users to interact with GitHub and AI via SMS. Simply by texting a number you could summarize issues, pull requests, repos, receive updates, and more.
This workflow brings the power of open source and AI to people who may not have consistent access to laptops, smartphones, or high-speed internet.
93% of the world has access to SMS.
Fewer than 65% have reliable internet or a smartphone.
Everyone should be able to participate in global innovation, contribute to the open source community, learn from others, and interact with AI.
This system enables:
- Participation in open source and AI regardless of location or hardware
- Communication over the SMS network
- Interaction with GitHub through a plain-text interface
This project can be adapted for a wide variety of scenarios, from individual developer productivity to large-scale community initiatives.
- Offline First Contribution: Allow individuals in areas with limited, expensive, or unreliable internet to contribute to open source projects by opening issues, commenting, and receiving updates via SMS.
- Bug Reporting from the Field: Enable users of open source software in remote locations to report bugs and provide feedback directly from their location using any mobile phone.
- Community Polling & Governance: Use SMS to allow community members to vote on project features, governance decisions, or new initiatives.
- Educational Access: Facilitate coding education without requiring a computer or broadband.
- Citizen Journalism & Data Collection: Empower individuals to submit reports, news tips, or structured data to a centralized repository.
- On the Go Issue Management: Capture a bug or idea while away from a desk.
- Emergency Code Review & Merge: Support carefully controlled emergency workflows from a phone.
- Quick Status Checks: Get repository, issue, or pull-request status without opening a laptop.
- Simple Project Scaffolding: Start predefined project workflows with a concise SMS command.
- Team Status Updates: Submit lightweight status updates by text.
- Triggering CI/CD Pipelines: Initiate a build, test, or deployment process through a tightly controlled GitHub Actions workflow.
- Infrastructure Status & Control: Request status or invoke predefined operational workflows.
- Incident Response & Management: Receive alerts and submit incident updates from a phone.
- Release Management: Trigger an allowlisted release workflow.
- Automated Reporting: Receive scheduled summaries of repository activity.
- Code & Project Summarization: Get a concise summary of a repository or issue discussion.
- Natural Language Bug Reports: Convert plain-language reports into structured issue drafts.
- Code Generation & Scaffolding: Request bounded code-generation workflows.
- Knowledge Base Queries: Ask questions about project documentation.
- AI-Assisted Task Management: Turn natural-language requests into carefully constrained tasks.
- Field Service & Maintenance Reporting: Report equipment status or maintenance tasks by SMS.
- Disaster Response & Coordination: Submit incidents, resource requests, and updates over low-bandwidth networks.
- Scientific Research & Citizen Science: Submit observations or findings from the field.
- Inventory & Asset Management: Log status or location changes through controlled workflows.