[Feature Request] Allow specified actors to bypass required approvals

[kenji-miyake]

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Currently, there is an option Allow specified actors to bypass required pull requests.

It doesn't work with the following use cases.
[Conditions]

• In order to keep code quality:
  • Require everyone including admins to make a pull request before merging.
    • It means Do not allow bypassing the above settings is on.
  • Require review from Code Owners.
  • Require status checks to pass before merging.
• There are 50+ developers in the project.
  • There are many components and each component has different code owners.

[Use cases]

• Code Owners of a certain component are absent for a while.
• The PR diff is large and many components are changed, which requires a lot of approvals from all related component code owners.
  • For example, updating APIs, applying formatters, etc.

In these cases, it's useful if admins can merge it by ignoring the required approvals, but Do not allow bypassing the above settings doesn't allow it.

There are some workarounds, but they have downsides as well:

• Temporarily disables the option Do not allow bypassing the above settings and enabled it back after merging the PR.
  • It's time-consuming.
  • It's a little unsafe.
• Create a global-code-owners group that can approve all PRs. (Add the group to each line of .github/CODEOWNERS.)
  • The global-code-owners group members receive too many review requests.
  • Or, if you add group members only when you need a super-approval (and remove them after the approval), it's time-consuming because you need to maintain the group members every time.

Therefore, it's useful if there is an option like Allow specified actors to bypass required approvals.
The option allows repository admins and specified accounts to bypass ONLY required approvals even when Do not allow bypassing the above settings is on.
Everyone still needs to submit a pull request and pass status checks.

Related discussion in our community: https://github.com/orgs/autowarefoundation/discussions/3060

What do you think about this?
Thank you.

[kenji-miyake]

With https://github.blog/changelog/2023-04-17-introducing-repository-rules-public-beta/, creating two rules can solve this issue.

1. Require pull request (bypass not permitted)

2. Require approval (bypass permitted)

[kenji-miyake]

With these rules,

GitHub blocks direct pushes to the protected branch,

but only allows bypassing approvals.