Debugging the GitHub Feed: Celery, Redis, and the Elusive 401 Error

When setting up the github_feed application locally for the first time, several friction points emerged related to environment configuration, pathing, and authentication. The primary issue preventing the feed from working was a consistent 401 Client Error: Unauthorized.

Here are the key discoveries and troubleshooting steps required to get the feed working in a local development environment.

1. Redis-Server (The Message Broker)

The Redis server configuration was correctly defined in settings.py (CELERY_BROKER_URL = "redis://localhost:6379/0"), but running the local instance was tricky.

  • The Issue: Attempting to manually start Redis with redis-server locally failed because the port was already in use.
  • The Fix: We discovered a Redis instance was already running on the development machine. The solution was simply to stop trying to start a second server and rely on the already active service.

Key Takeaway: Ensure only one Redis instance is active and reachable via the configured URL.

2. Celery Worker (The Task Runner)

The local Celery worker process couldn't be started successfully due to pathing inconsistencies.

  • The Issue 1 (Module Not Found): The command celery -A makeitexist worker failed because the application's configuration module was named config, not makeitexist.
  • The Fix 1: The command needed to be run from the correct directory using the right module name: celery -A config worker --loglevel=info.
  • The Issue 2 (Generic Service Names in Prod): In the production Linode environment, services were named generically (celery-worker.service) rather than project-specifically (makeitexist_...).
  • The Fix 2: The production service files were renamed to makeitexist_celery_worker.service and makeitexist_celery_beat.service for clarity and safe, project-specific management via systemd and the new deployment script.

3. Debugging and Data Integrity

The core reason the feed produced no data was the consistent 401 Client Error: Unauthorized response from the GitHub API.

  • The Root Cause (User Error): The GITHUB_PAT (Personal Access Token) was either missing, expired, or truncated during a copy/paste operation (copied from a non-maximized terminal window).
  • The Technical Fix: The Django application used django-environ to load the PAT from a local .env file. We used temporary print() statements in settings.py to verify the actual value being read by Python, confirming the value itself was the problem.
  • The Result: Once a valid token was provided, API calls succeeded. Logs confirmed data synchronization was successful, resolving the admin panel issue.

By systematically addressing environment pathing for the Celery worker, confirming the validity of the GitHub PAT, and verifying Redis operation, the local development environment became fully operational.