GraphQL.js

This is a technical preview of the JavaScript reference implementation for GraphQL, a query language created by Facebook for describing data requirements on complex application data models.

See more complete documentation at http://graphql.org/ and http://graphql.org/docs/api-reference-graphql/.

For questions, ask Stack Overflow.

For discussion, join #graphql on Discord.

Technical Preview Contents

This technical preview contains a [draft specification for GraphQL] (https://github.com/facebook/graphql) and a reference implementation in JavaScript that implements that draft, GraphQL.js.

The reference implementation provides base libraries in JavaScript that would provide the basis for full GraphQL implementations and tools. It is not a fully standalone GraphQL server that a client developer could use to start manipulating and querying data. Most importantly, it provides no mapping to a functioning, production-ready backend. The only “backend” we have targeted for this early preview are in-memory stubs in test cases.

We are releasing this now because after GraphQL was first discussed publicly, many engineers used this information to implement the parts of the system that we discussed publicly. We want to support those engineers by providing both a formal specification and a reference implementation for the system as a whole.

To that end, the target audience is not the client developer, but those who have built or are actively interested in building their own GraphQL implementations and tools. Critically, we also want feedback on the system and to incorporate that feedback in our final release.

In order to be broadly adopted, GraphQL will have to target a wide variety of backends, frameworks, and languages, which will necessitate a collaborative effort across projects and organizations. This technical preview marks the beginning of that process.

Getting Started

An overview of GraphQL in general is available in the README for the Specification for GraphQL. That overview describes a simple set of GraphQL examples that exist as tests in this repository. A good way to get started with this repository is to walk through that README and the corresponding tests in parallel.

Using GraphQL.js

Install GraphQL.js from npm

npm install --save graphql

GraphQL.js provides two important capabilities: building a type schema, and serving queries against that type schema.

First, build a GraphQL type schema which maps to your code base.

import {
  graphql,
  GraphQLSchema,
  GraphQLObjectType,
  GraphQLString
} from 'graphql';

var schema = new GraphQLSchema({
  query: new GraphQLObjectType({
    name: 'RootQueryType',
    fields: {
      hello: {
        type: GraphQLString,
        resolve() {
          return 'world';
        }
      }
    }
  })
});

This defines a simple schema with one type and one field, that resolves to a fixed value. The resolve function can return a value, a promise, or an array of promises. A more complex example is included in the top level tests directory.

Then, serve the result of a query against that type schema.

var query = '{ hello }';

graphql(schema, query).then(result => {

  // Prints
  // {
  //   data: { hello: "world" }
  // }
  console.log(result);

});

This runs a query fetching the one field defined. The graphql function will first ensure the query is syntactically and semantically valid before executing it, reporting errors otherwise.

var query = '{ boyhowdy }';

graphql(schema, query).then(result => {

  // Prints
  // {
  //   errors: [
  //     { message: 'Cannot query field boyhowdy on RootQueryType',
  //       locations: [ { line: 1, column: 3 } ] }
  //   ]
  // }
  console.log(result);

});

Want to ride the bleeding edge?

The npm branch in this repository is automatically maintained to be the last commit to master to pass all tests, in the same form found on npm. It is recommend to use builds deployed npm for many reasons, but if you want to use the latest not-yet-released version of graphql-js, you can do so by depending directly on this branch:

npm install graphql-js@git://github.com/graphql/graphql-js.git#npm

Contributing

We actively welcome pull requests, learn how to contribute.

Changelog

Changes are tracked as Github releases.

License

GraphQL is BSD-licensed. We also provide an additional patent grant.