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Product questions often have their real answer in the code: is this already built, how does it work today, did the fix ship? Without access to the repo, those questions go to an engineer and wait. The GitHub integration lets Lane answer them directly, by reading your code, pull requests and commits, so anyone on the team can get a grounded answer in seconds and engineers keep their focus. It also ties the code to the customer problem: link the pull requests that fix a Signal, and Lane keeps their state on the Signal and can close it once they merge. Lane only reads. It never opens issues or pull requests, and never commits.

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What it’s good for

Once connected, ask Lane things like:
  • “Is the new pricing tier already wired up?”
  • “Did the CSV export fix ship?”
  • “How does our webhook handler work today?”
  • “What changed in billing over the last two weeks?”
Lane answers whether something is built, partly built or not found, and names the files it looked at. If it can’t find something, it says it couldn’t find it in the code rather than claiming it doesn’t exist. It’s especially useful for non-engineers who’d otherwise need to ping engineering, for Docs that should reflect what’s really in the repo, and for checking a customer request against what’s already shipped.

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Connect

  1. Go to Settings → Integrations → GitHub and choose Connect.
  2. Install the Lane GitHub App on your GitHub organization, choosing which repositories it can access.
  3. Back in Lane, choose the Repository and the Branch your team ships from.
The branch you choose is Lane’s focus: pull requests merged into it count as shipped, and open ones as work in progress. Once a repository is chosen, everyone in your Lane workspace can use it.

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Permissions requested

The Lane GitHub App asks only for read access:
  • Contents: read, to read files
  • Metadata: read, to list branches and find files
  • Pull requests: read, to read pull requests and what they changed
No write access of any kind is requested.

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Pull requests on Signals

A fix often goes straight to a pull request, with no issue in between. Link it to the Signal it answers, so the customer problem and the code that fixes it sit together. On a Signal, open the Send to menu and choose Link existing → GitHub pull request, then search for it by title or paste its link. A Signal can have several. Each one shows as a tag above the Signal’s title with its state (open, draft, merged or closed), kept current as the pull request moves on GitHub. Hover a tag to open the pull request or Unlink it. On an accepted Opportunity, the pull requests linked to its Signals are listed in its side column. Linking reads from GitHub and changes nothing there. If GitHub isn’t connected yet, the menu item takes you to Settings → Integrations → GitHub to connect it.

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Close Signals when their pull requests merge

Shipping the fix should be the last step anyone takes. With Close Signals when their pull requests merge on, Lane closes a Signal once every pull request linked to it has merged, and closing it marks its feedback done and, with close the loop turned on, tells the customers who asked.
  • A Signal closes only when all its pull requests are finished, so one merged pull request out of several doesn’t close it.
  • A Signal whose Linear issue or Notion page syncs its status follows that instead, so the two never pull in different directions.
  • A pull request that had already merged when you linked it counts too, so the Signal can close straight away.
The setting is in Settings → Integrations → GitHub, under Signals, and is on by default. Turn it off if your team merges well before customers can use the change, so nobody hears “it’s shipped” too early.

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GitHub in Agents

Agents can start when a pull request merges in your chosen repository (Pull request merged, narrowed to a base branch if you like), for example to draft release notes linked to the customers who asked, or to link the pull request to the Signals it fixes. GitHub is read only as an agent connector.

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Good to know

  • One repository at a time. Lane answers questions from the repository you’ve chosen; switch it in Settings any time. Pull requests from any repository the Lane GitHub App can see can be linked to Signals.
  • Read only. To have a coding agent build from a Doc and open a pull request, use Cursor.
  • Disconnecting. Disconnect from Settings → Integrations → GitHub, or remove the Lane GitHub App from your GitHub organization to revoke access at the source.

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FAQs

Q: Can Lane write to my repo?
A: No. The integration is read-only: no commits, no pull requests, no issues. Q: How does Lane know what shipped?
A: From pull requests merged into the branch you chose in Settings. Q: Will merging a pull request close my Signal?
A: Yes, when it’s linked to the Signal, every other pull request linked to it has finished too, and Close Signals when their pull requests merge is on. A Signal whose Linear issue or Notion page syncs its status follows that instead. Q: Does it work on private repos?
A: Yes, as long as the Lane GitHub App has access to the repository on GitHub. Q: Who can see what Lane finds in the repo?
A: Only the people who can see the chat or Doc where it was referenced. Lane doesn’t expose the repo more broadly than it already is.