Document GH_AW_GITHUB_TOKEN removal and enterprise 8-day PAT policy

[Evangelink]

Why

The Grade Tests on PR agentic workflow (and every other gh-aw workflow here) was failing at the Checkout PR branch step, e.g. run 28666711551 on #9583:

GET /repos/microsoft/testfx/collaborators/Evangelink/permission - 403
GET /repos/microsoft/testfx/pulls/9583 - 403
The 'Microsoft Open Source' enterprise forbids access via a fine-grained
personal access token if the token's lifetime is greater than 8 days.

The enterprise now hard-rejects fine-grained PATs whose lifetime exceeds 8 days. The failing step resolves its token as GH_AW_GITHUB_MCP_SERVER_TOKEN || GH_AW_GITHUB_TOKEN || GITHUB_TOKEN, so the over-lifetime GH_AW_GITHUB_TOKEN PAT it picked up got 403'd.

Fix

The actual remediation is an ops action, not a code change: delete the GH_AW_GITHUB_TOKEN secret so the compiler's token chain falls back to the built-in per-run GITHUB_TOKEN. This is safe repo-wide because:

• No source .md workflow uses lockdown: true (removed repo-wide) or references the PAT secrets by hand.
• All declare min-integrity: none, so nothing forces a custom PAT — they only prefer it when present.
• All 30 compiled workflows share the identical fallback chain, so a single secret deletion fixes them all at once.

The only residual gap is write-backs on fork PRs (where GITHUB_TOKEN is read-only) — those should move to the org-owned GitHub App already documented in this README.

Change

Docs-only: updates .github/workflows/README.md to

• reflect the concrete enterprise ≤8-day enforcement (previously worded as "~1 week" org policy),
• note that GH_AW_GITHUB_TOKEN should be left unset so workflows degrade to GITHUB_TOKEN,
• record the fast-unblock command and the fork-PR caveat.

No workflow behavior changes; .lock.yml files are untouched (no recompile needed).

Co-authored-by: Copilot App 223556219+Copilot@users.noreply.github.com

[Copilot]

Pull request overview

Documentation update to the agentic workflows README, clarifying the enterprise enforcement around fine-grained PAT lifetimes and the intended token fallback behavior so workflows don’t break when GH_AW_GITHUB_TOKEN is present but invalid.

Changes:

• Updates the PAT policy wording to reflect the enterprise’s hard ≤8-day enforcement and the observed 403 failure mode.
• Documents that GH_AW_GITHUB_TOKEN should be left unset so workflows fall back to the per-run GITHUB_TOKEN.
• Adds a “fast unblock” remediation command and notes the fork-PR write-back caveat.

Show a summary per file

File	Description
.github/workflows/README.md	Updates secrets/auth documentation to reflect the 8-day PAT enforcement and the recommended fallback/remediation steps.

Review details

• Files reviewed: 1/1 changed files
• Comments generated: 2
• Review effort level: Low

[github-actions]

Note

🤖 Automated review by GitHub Copilot. Posted via a maintainer's GitHub token, so it appears under their account — the account owner did not write or approve this content personally. Generated by the Expert Code Review workflow. To request a follow-up action, reply by tagging @copilot directly.

✅ 22/22 dimensions clean — no findings.

Applicable dimensions verified:

• §17 Documentation Accuracy — The token fallback chain (GH_AW_GITHUB_MCP_SERVER_TOKEN || GH_AW_GITHUB_TOKEN || GITHUB_TOKEN) matches what's compiled into .lock.yml files. The enterprise 8-day PAT enforcement policy, gh secret delete syntax, lockdown removal history, and the fork-PR GITHUB_TOKEN read-only caveat are all factually accurate and consistent with the existing README context.
• §3 Security — The guidance to reduce secret surface area (delete the PAT, fall back to GITHUB_TOKEN) is sound. No credential exposure risk in the documented command.
• §21 Scope & PR Discipline — Single-concern docs-only PR, well-motivated by actual workflow failures.

All other dimensions (1–2, 4–16, 18–20, 22) are N/A for this docs-only change.