Launching PHP GitHub Sponsors

First published on August 27, 2021 · Last updated on April 4, 2022

Update 04/04/22: Unfortunately, in the meantime I've decided to abandon this package due to a lack of time.

I'm very happy to say that Tom and I finally launched PHP GitHub Sponsors, a package for PHP to interact with the GitHub Sponsors GraphQL API.

Currently, PHP GitHub Sponsors allows you to do ACL based checks to see if one GitHub account is sponsoring another. While the package is framework agnostic so it can be used in any PHP application, it also comes with integration for the Laravel framework.

Here's an example how you'd use it. First, set up a personal access token in your .env file:

GH_SPONSORS_TOKEN=ghp_xxx

This access token should have the user:read and organization:read scopes.

Then, you can start using the package:

use GitHub\Sponsors\Facades\GitHubSponsors;

// Check if driesvints is being sponsored by nunomaduro...
GitHubSponsors::login('driesvints')->isSponsoredBy('nunomaduro');

// Check if the blade-ui-kit organization is sponsored by nunomaduro...
GitHubSponsors::login('nunomaduro')->isSponsoring('blade-ui-kit');

// Check if the authenticated user is sponsored by Gummibeer...
GitHubSponsors::viewer()->isSponsoredBy('Gummibeer');

// Check if the authenticated user is sponsoring driesvints...
GitHubSponsors::viewer()->isSponsoring('driesvints');

You can also retrieve the client from the IoC container and perform calls on it:

use GitHub\Sponsors\Client;
use Illuminate\Http\Request;
use Illuminate\Support\Facades\Route;

Route::get('/home', function (Request $request, Client $sponsors) {
    $isSponsoring = $sponsors->viewer()->isSponsoredBy(
        $request->get('github_username')
    );

    if ($isSponsoring) {
        return redirect('/secret-homepage');
    }

    return view('welcome');
});

Sponsorable

Additionally, you can add the GitHub\Sponsors\Concerns\Sponsorable trait to an Eloquent model like the User model to make it sponsorable:

use GitHub\Sponsors\Concerns\Sponsorable;
use GitHub\Sponsors\Contracts\Sponsorable as SponsorableContract;
use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model;

class User extends Model implements SponsorableContract
{
    use Sponsorable;
}

Then, the user will use the value of its github column as its username. A user can also add their personal access token on the github_token column to let them check their private sponsorships.

Now you can use the model as follows:

$user = User::where('github', 'driesvints')->first();

// Check if driesvints is being sponsored by nunomaduro...
$user->isSponsoredBy('nunomaduro');

// Check if driesvints is sponsoring nunomaduro...
$user->isSponsoring('driesvints');

For more usage and details, check out the documentation.

Roadmap

Initially I wanted to provide much more features in the package. But because I only managed to work on the package sporadically over the past few months I felt that it wasn't coming along fast enough. That's why I decided to release it early with a minimum feature set and continue to work on it in the open.

We still have quite a bit of planned for the package. Here's some of the features on our roadmap:

Conclusion

This package couldn't have happened without some awesome people. I'd really like to thank Claudio Dekker for all his feedback and help while developing the package. I'd also like to thank Sarah Vessels for all her help with providing feedback on the GitHub GraphQL API. And lastly I want to thank Tom Witkowski for joining me as a co-maintainer and helping out with developing and improving the package.

I hope you'll like this one and if you do end up using the package definitely let me know on Twitter. Enjoy!

About me

I'm a software engineer from Belgium. I work as one of the core team members of Laravel, the popular PHP framework.

I'm also the creator of Eventy, a platform that connects the dots between user groups, speakers, conferences and attendees.

My passions are open-source, growing communities, and building products that people love.