AutoUpdate (`autoupdate/v1-alpha`)

Keeping your Kubebuilder project up to date with the latest improvements shouldn’t be a chore. With a small amount of setup, you can receive automatic Pull Request suggestions whenever a new Kubebuilder release is available — keeping your project maintained, secure, and aligned with ecosystem changes.

This automation uses the kubebuilder alpha update command with a 3-way merge strategy to refresh your project scaffold, and wraps it in a GitHub Actions workflow that opens an Issue with a Pull Request compare link so you can create the PR and review it.

When to Use It

When you want to reduce the burden of keeping the project updated and well-maintained.
When you want guidance and help from AI to know what changes are needed to keep your project up to date and to solve conflicts (requires --use-gh-models flag and GitHub Models permissions).

How to Use It

If you want to add the autoupdate plugin to your project:

kubebuilder edit --plugins="autoupdate/v1-alpha"

If you want to create a new project with the autoupdate plugin:

kubebuilder init --plugins=go/v4,autoupdate/v1-alpha

Optional: GitHub Models AI Summary

By default, the workflow works without GitHub Models to avoid permission errors. If you want AI-generated summaries in your update issues:

kubebuilder edit --plugins="autoupdate/v1-alpha" --use-gh-models

How It Works

The plugin scaffolds a GitHub Actions workflow that checks for new Kubebuilder releases every week. When an update is available, it:

Creates a new branch with the merged changes
Opens a GitHub Issue with a PR compare link

Example Issue:

With GitHub Models enabled (optional), you also get AI-generated summaries:

Conflict help (when needed):

Troubleshooting

If you get the 403 Forbidden Error

Error message:

ERROR Update failed error=failed to open GitHub issue: gh models run failed: exit status 1
Error: unexpected response from the server: 403 Forbidden

Quick fix: Disable GitHub Models (works for everyone)

kubebuilder edit --plugins="autoupdate/v1-alpha"

This regenerates the workflow without GitHub Models:

permissions:
  contents: write
  issues: write
  # No models: read permission

steps:
  - name: Checkout repository
    uses: actions/checkout@v4
    # ... other setup steps

  - name: Run kubebuilder alpha update
    # WARNING: This workflow does not use GitHub Models AI summary by default.
    # To enable AI-generated summaries, you need permissions to use GitHub Models.
    # If you have the required permissions, re-run:
    #   kubebuilder edit --plugins="autoupdate/v1-alpha" --use-gh-models
    run: |
      kubebuilder alpha update \
        --force \
        --push \
        --restore-path .github/workflows \
        --open-gh-issue

The workflow continues to work—just without AI summaries.

To enable GitHub Models instead:

Ask your GitHub administrator to enable Models (see links below)
Enable it in Settings → Code and automation → Models
Re-run with:

kubebuilder edit --plugins="autoupdate/v1-alpha" --use-gh-models

This regenerates the workflow WITH GitHub Models:

permissions:
  contents: write
  issues: write
  models: read  # Added for GitHub Models

steps:
  - name: Checkout repository
    uses: actions/checkout@v4
    # ... other setup steps

  - name: Install gh-models extension
    run: |
      gh extension install github/gh-models --force
      gh models --help >/dev/null

  - name: Run kubebuilder alpha update
    # --use-gh-models: Adds an AI-generated comment to the Issue with
    #   a summary of scaffold changes and conflict-resolution guidance (if any).
    run: |
      kubebuilder alpha update \
        --force \
        --push \
        --restore-path .github/workflows \
        --open-gh-issue \
        --use-gh-models

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