GST Regulatory Dashboard — Fully Hosted on GitHub (No Machine Required)

This version needs no computer of yours to stay on. GitHub itself runs the scraper on a schedule and hosts the dashboard. Once set up, it runs indefinitely with zero ongoing action from you.

.github/workflows/scrape.yml   → runs scrape_and_notify.py every hour, automatically
scrape_and_notify.py            → scrapes cbic-gst.gov.in, updates data.json, emails alerts
data.json                       → the data — just a file, committed by the Action
subscribers.json                → who gets emailed — edit + commit to change
dashboard.html                  → the dashboard itself, served by GitHub Pages

What's different from the local version

	Local (python app.py)	This version
Needs your computer on	Yes	No — runs on GitHub's servers
"Refresh" button	Live re-scrape on click	Reloads the last scheduled result (scraping itself only happens on the hourly schedule)
Email subscribe	Self-service box in the UI	Edit subscribers.json directly and commit
Email provider	Your own Gmail (needs 2-Step Verification + App Password)	Brevo (free, no 2-Step Verification required)

One-time setup (about 15 minutes)

1. Create the repository

1. Go to github.com → sign in (or create a free account)
2. Click New repository → name it (e.g. gst-dashboard) → Public (required for free GitHub Pages + unlimited free Actions minutes) → Create
3. Upload every file in this folder to that repository (drag-and-drop works on the repo's main page, or use git push if you're comfortable with Git)

2. Turn on GitHub Pages

1. In the repo, go to Settings → Pages
2. Under "Build and deployment", set Source to "Deploy from a branch"
3. Branch: main, folder: / (root) → Save
4. After a minute, your dashboard is live at:

   https://<your-username>.github.io/<repo-name>/dashboard.html
   

   That's your permanent link — bookmark it, share it.

3. Set up free email (Brevo — no 2-Step Verification)

1. Go to brevo.com → Sign up free (just an email + password — no forced 2FA)
2. Verify your email address (a normal confirmation link, not 2FA)
3. In Brevo, go to SMTP & API (usually under your account/company name menu, top right)
4. Under "SMTP", note your SMTP login and generate/copy your SMTP key
5. Go to Senders in Brevo and add/verify the email address you want alerts to come from (a simple email confirmation, not 2FA)

4. Add your Brevo credentials as GitHub Secrets

1. In your repo: Settings → Secrets and variables → Actions → New repository secret
2. Add three secrets:
   • BREVO_SMTP_LOGIN → your Brevo SMTP login
   • BREVO_SMTP_KEY → your Brevo SMTP key
   • BREVO_SENDER_EMAIL → the verified "from" address
3. These are encrypted by GitHub and never appear in logs or the repo itself.

5. Add who gets emailed

Edit subscribers.json directly on GitHub (click the file → pencil icon to edit) and commit:

{
  "emails": ["[email protected]", "[email protected]"]
}

6. Turn on the schedule

1. Go to the Actions tab in your repo
2. If prompted, click "I understand my workflows, go ahead and enable them"
3. That's it — it now runs automatically every hour, forever, with no further action from you.

7. Test it right now instead of waiting an hour

1. Go to Actions → Scrape GST/CBIC updates and email alerts (left sidebar)
2. Click Run workflow → Run workflow (green button)
3. Watch it run (takes under a minute); check the logs for what it found
4. Refresh your dashboard URL from step 2 to see the result

Cost

Piece	Cost
GitHub repo + Actions (public repo)	$0 — 2,000+ free minutes/month, this uses ~1 min/hour = ~730 min/month, comfortably inside the free tier
GitHub Pages hosting	$0 — free, unlimited, for public repos
Email (Brevo)	$0 — 300 emails/day free, forever, no card
Total	$0/month, indefinitely, with nothing running on any machine of yours

Known limitations (same as the local version)

• Only the CBIC scraper runs here — the GST-portal (NIC advisories) scraper needs a headless browser and hasn't been adapted to this version. It can be added later as a second, separate job if useful.
• The "Refresh" button reloads the latest scheduled result — it does not trigger an instant live scrape (there's no server to ask for one). If you need to force an immediate check, use the manual "Run workflow" button in step 7 above.
• Subscribing is now a file edit + commit, not a self-service form — a trade-off of not having a live backend.