Some notes on GitHub GraphQL

I recently was working on a GitHub workflow to improve developer interactions and decided a opt-in feature to auto-minimize comments that violated community guidelines would be a nice addition to the curated experience.

I was able to bring this idea to life using the GitHub REST API and GitHub GraphQL. The process to actually getting this feature up and running was quite the ride. I think though GitHub GraphQL has powerful foundation to capture the dynamic interactions in the repository and the simplistic nature of the REST API proves to be quite straightforward, the slight inconsistencies between the REST API and GraphQL make the two quite tricky to integrate with each other.

Take a look at the tools here:

• REST API (opens in a new tab)
• GraphQL (opens in a new tab)

This discussion thread (opens in a new tab) captures the frustration where are drastic shifts made to developer tools without thorough documentation/differentiation.

I think for a first-time user, GraphQL is already a handful to ramp up on and the slight yet vital changes just make for a slippery slope where you are so close yet so far from actually achieving your vision.

In case your curious, this is the solution we ended up implementing: https://github.com/jonathanpeppers/inclusive-heat-sensor/pull/15/files (opens in a new tab). I think the commit history speaks for itself..