gh-cli

GitHub CLI - Remote Analysis & Discovery

Remote repository operations, codebase comparison, and code discovery without cloning.

When to Use

• Analyze repositories without cloning
• Compare codebases side-by-side
• Fetch specific files from any repo
• Find trending repositories and code patterns
• Search code across GitHub

Quick Operations

Fetch a file remotely

gh api repos/OWNER/REPO/contents/path/file.ts --template '{{.content | base64decode}}'

Get directory listing

gh api repos/OWNER/REPO/contents/PATH

Search code

gh search code "pattern" --language=typescript

Find trending repos

gh search repos --language=rust --sort stars --order desc

Compare Two Codebases

Systematic workflow for comparing repositories to identify similarities and differences.

Example use: "Compare solana-fm/explorer-kit and tenequm/solana-idls"

Step 1: Fetch directory structures

gh api repos/OWNER-A/REPO-A/contents/PATH
gh api repos/OWNER-B/REPO-B/contents/PATH

If comparing a monorepo package, specify the path (e.g., packages/explorerkit-idls).

Step 2: Compare file lists

gh api repos/OWNER-A/REPO-A/contents/PATH -q '.[].name'
gh api repos/OWNER-B/REPO-B/contents/PATH -q '.[].name'

Compare the output of each command to identify files unique to each repo and common files.

Step 3: Fetch key files for comparison

Compare package dependencies:

gh api repos/OWNER-A/REPO-A/contents/package.json --template '{{.content | base64decode}}'
gh api repos/OWNER-B/REPO-B/contents/package.json --template '{{.content | base64decode}}'

Compare main entry points:

gh api repos/OWNER-A/REPO-A/contents/src/index.ts --template '{{.content | base64decode}}'
gh api repos/OWNER-B/REPO-B/contents/src/index.ts --template '{{.content | base64decode}}'

Step 4: Analyze differences

Compare the fetched files to identify:

API Surface

• What functions/classes are exported?
• Are the APIs similar or completely different?

Dependencies

• Shared dependencies (same approach)
• Different dependencies (different implementation)

Unique Features

• Features only in repo1
• Features only in repo2

For detailed comparison strategies, see [references/comparison.md](references/comparison.md).

Discover Trending Content

Find trending repositories

# Most starred repos
gh search repos --sort stars --order desc --limit 20

# Trending in specific language
gh search repos --language=rust --sort stars --order desc

# Recently popular (created in last month)
gh search repos "created:>2024-10-01" --sort stars --order desc

# Trending in specific topic
gh search repos "topic:machine-learning" --sort stars --order desc

Discover popular code patterns

# Find popular implementations (code search has no sorting - scope with filters)
gh search code "function useWallet" --language=typescript

# Scope to a known repo (code search can't filter by stars - stars:>N is literal text)
gh search code "implementation" --repo=honojs/hono

# Search specific organization
gh search code "authentication" --owner=anthropics

For complete discovery queries and patterns, see [references/discovery.md](references/discovery.md).

Search Basics

Code search

# Search across all repositories
gh search code "API endpoint" --language=python

# Search in specific organization
gh search code "auth" --owner=anthropics

# Exclude results with negative qualifiers
gh search issues -- "bug report -label:wontfix"

Issue & PR search

# Find open bugs
gh search issues --label=bug --state=open

# Search assigned issues
gh search issues --assignee=@me --state=open

For advanced search syntax, see [references/search.md](references/search.md).

Special Syntax

Field name inconsistencies

IMPORTANT: GitHub CLI uses inconsistent field names across commands:

| Field | gh repo view | gh search repos | |-------|----------------|-------------------| | Stars | stargazerCount | stargazersCount | | Forks | forkCount | forksCount |

Examples:

# ✅ Correct for gh repo view
gh repo view owner/repo --json stargazerCount,forkCount

# ✅ Correct for gh search repos
gh search repos "query" --json stargazersCount,forksCount

Excluding search results

When using negative qualifiers (like -label:bug), use -- to prevent the hyphen from being interpreted as a flag:

gh search issues -- "query -label:bug"

For more syntax gotchas, see [references/syntax.md](references/syntax.md).

Advanced Workflows

For detailed documentation on specific workflows:

Core Workflows:

• [remote-analysis.md](references/remote-analysis.md) - Advanced file fetching patterns
• [comparison.md](references/comparison.md) - Complete codebase comparison guide
• [discovery.md](references/discovery.md) - All trending and discovery queries
• [search.md](references/search.md) - Advanced search syntax
• [syntax.md](references/syntax.md) - Special syntax and command quirks

GitHub Operations:

• [repositories.md](references/repositories.md) - Repository operations
• [pull_requests.md](references/pull_requests.md) - PR workflows
• [issues.md](references/issues.md) - Issue management
• [actions.md](references/actions.md) - GitHub Actions
• [releases.md](references/releases.md) - Release management

Setup & Configuration:

• [getting_started.md](references/getting_started.md) - Installation and auth
• [other.md](references/other.md) - Environment variables, aliases, config
• [extensions.md](references/extensions.md) - CLI extensions

Resources

• Official docs: https://cli.github.com/manual/
• GitHub CLI: https://github.com/cli/cli
• Search syntax: https://docs.github.com/en/search-github