Add Compare API in GraphQL

[sashaafm]

Hello GitHub,

I'd like to ask (or suggest) if there are plans to include a similar operation of comparing two commits to the GraphQL API like it's present in the REST API one? The action in question is the following: Compare API.

This would greatly benefit integrators using this API as the GraphgQL version would reduce a lot of traffic usage and machine resources as the unwanted patches could be omitted from response.

Thank you!

[sashaafm]

An alternative I'd like to suggest is to add parameters that somehow allow unwanted patches from being omitted in the response.

[jarhill0]

On refs, it's possible to compare two branches/tags (e.g. comparing myFeatureBranch to main):

query { 
  repository(name: "my_repo", owner: "me") { 
    ref(qualifiedName: "main") {
      compare(headRef: "myFeatureBranch") {
        commits(first: 5) {
          nodes {
            oid
          }
        }
      }
    }
  }
}

This gives all of the commits on myFeatureBranch that are not on main.

BUT, when trying to pass in a commit SHA, it doesn't work, because both ref#qualifiedName and compare#headRef expect git References, and do not accept commit SHAs.

As I understand it, a git ref is pretty much just a nice label that resolves to a specific commit SHA, so it seems weird to me that we cannot pass a SHA directly here.

[whitecat]

Sadly this does not help when the branch is merged to main, there will be no difference between the two and you cannot recover the branch commits.