New Gitea spring cleaning release v1.23.7

We explored the latest patch release from Gitea. This release includes UI, CLI and admin improvements. Here are the 8 notable changes we think you are going to love:

1. New config - Block expensive page views from users that are not signed in

A new value has been added to the existing REQUIRE_SIGNIN_VIEW config to block expensive page views. It now accepts a third literal value, expensive, in addition to the long-standing false (default) and true. This is experimental and might change:

[service]
REQUIRE_SIGNIN_VIEW = expensive

Enabling this config will block users that are not signed in from accessing resource-heavy pages like the network graph, blame view, code-frequency charts, etc. Visitors who are not signed in can browse light-weight pages like repo file lists and issues.

Why you might use it:

• Keeps public read-only access open for humans and simple crawlers.
• Stops bandwidth or CPU-intensive scrapers from hammering graphs and history endpoints on a busy instance.

2. New experimental config - Smart SSH host‑key pick‑up

If you leave SSH_SERVER_CERT unset, Gitea now auto‑loads the system's default host certificate so SSH just works out of the box.

3. CLI change - user access token improvement

The cli now simplifies creating a user access token. It used to be 2 steps. Step 1 was creating a token for a user and step 2 was giving the token a name and setting scopes (permissions). However, they have updated the gitea admin user create-access-token command to do it all at once.

Example

gitea admin user create-access-token \
  --user alice \
  --name ci-build \
  --scopes repo,write:package

4. UI tweak - Emojis that match your device

All emojis now display your browser’s native emoji set when you read or write markdown. Previously, some browsers showed grey sprite boxes or low‑resolution icons instead of full‑colour emoji.

5.UI cleanup - Smarter repo sidebar

If you only have read‑only access, the left‑hand menu now hides "Contributors", "Recent Commits" and other tabs that would have led to 404 screens in the previous version of Gitea.

6. Readmes got a whole lot prettier

Well, not just readmes but all markdown. YAML/JSON metadata at the top of markdown files no longer shows when you view markdown. So visitors (and search engines) see the real content first.

7. PR user journey improvement

After you have received your first round of feedback on your pull request, you would have to push your updates and then manually request another code review from reviewers with the CODEOWNERS role (people automatically assigned because they are listed as "owners" of the files you changed). This update now automates this process and notifies the reviewers with the CODEOWNERS role each time you push new code.

8. UI switcheroo - Roomier issue & PR headers

The buttons for adding Labels and setting Milestones on issues, pull requests, and project boards now sit in the right‑hand action bar. They used to live in the top tab strip and would wrap onto a second line on smaller screens.

Summary