GraphQL Documentation Generator for Docusaurus

This plugin generates a Markdown documentation from a GraphQL schema.

The documentation is generated for Docusaurus docs feature.

Try it

Use the CodeSandbox template or fork our demo repo to try with your own GraphQL schema.

1. Edit the configuration in graphql-markdown.config.js
2. Run npx docusaurus graphql-to-doc in a new terminal

Installation

graphql package is a peer-dependency starting version 1.7.0, and it must be installed separatly.

npm

npm install @edno/docusaurus2-graphql-doc-generator graphql

Yarn

yarn add @edno/docusaurus2-graphql-doc-generator graphql

Add @edno/docusaurus2-graphql-doc-generator to your site's docusaurus.config.js plugins option:

module.exports = {
  // ...
  plugins: ["@edno/docusaurus2-graphql-doc-generator"],
};

Usage

The plugin adds a new command graphql-to-doc to the Docusaurus CLI.

npx docusaurus graphql-to-doc

Command line options are described in the section Options.

Configuration

You can define some or all of the plugin options directly at the plugin level in the Docusaurus configuration file docusaurus.config.js:

module.exports = {
  // ...
  plugins: [
    [
      "@edno/docusaurus2-graphql-doc-generator",
      {
        schema: "./schema/swapi.graphql",
        rootPath: "./docs", // docs will be generated under './docs/swapi' (rootPath/baseURL)
        baseURL: "swapi",
        homepage: "./docs/swapi.md",
      },
    ],
  ],
};

Each option is described in the section Options.

See multi-intance section, if you want to use 2 distinct schemas.

Site Settings

You will also need to add a link to your documentation on your site. One way to do it is to add it to your site's navbar in docusaurus.config.js:

module.exports = {
  // ...
  navbar: {
    items: [
      {
        to: "/swapi/homepage", // adjust the location depending on your baseURL (see configuration)
        label: "SWAPI Schema", // change the label with yours
        position: "left",
      },
    ],
  },
};

For more details about navbar, please refer to Docusaurus 2 documentation.

Sidebars Settings

A sidebar file sidebar-schema.js will be generated for the documentation, you have different options depending on your Docusaurus setup:

1. Single Docs instance

In this use case, you have a unique set of documentation, then you just need to add a reference to sidebar-schema.js into the default sidebar.js.

module.exports = {
  docsSidebar: [
    // ... your site's sidebar
  ],
  ...require("./docs/swapi/sidebar-schema.js"),
};

Important

The sidebar path must be relative to the sidebars.js location. By default, the plugin provides a relative path from the root folder of Docusaurus.

For example, if your sidebars.js is located under ./src folder, then you need to go one level up in the path: ./../docs/swapi/sidebar-schema

2. Docs Multi-instance

In this use case, you have multiple sets of documentation (a.k.a. Docs Multi-instance), then you need to add a reference to sidebar-schema.js into the dedicated instance of @docusaurus/plugin-content-docs:

plugins: [
  [
    "@docusaurus/plugin-content-docs",
    {
      id: "api",
      path: "api",
      routeBasePath: "api",
      sidebarPath: require.resolve("./api/sidebar-schema.js"),
      // ... other options
    },
  ],
],

Plugin Multi-instance

From 1.9.0, the plugin can support multiple instances.

To add another instance, you need to assign a unique id attribute to plugin instances (if not set, then id value is default).

plugins: [
    [
      "@edno/docusaurus2-graphql-doc-generator",
       {
        // id: 'swapi', // omitted => default instance
        schema: "./schema/swapi.graphql",
        rootPath: "./docs", // docs will be generated under './docs/swapi' (rootPath/baseURL)
        baseURL: "swapi",
        homepage: "./docs/swapi.md",
      },
    ],
    [
      "@edno/docusaurus2-graphql-doc-generator",
      {
        id: "admin",
        schema: "./schema/admin.graphql",
        rootPath: "./docs", // docs will be generated under './docs/admin' (rootPath/baseURL)
        baseURL: "admin",
        homepage: "./docs/admin.md",
      },
    ],
  ],

Instance with an id will have their own command line:

npx docusaurus graphql-to-doc:admin

Options

By default, the plugin will use the options as defined in the plugin's configuration, but they can be overridden by passing them with the command.

Documentation options

From 1.10.0, the plugin allows disabling some of the Docusaurus documentation features:

• docOptions.pagination: page buttons Previous and Next
• docOptions.toc: page table of content

By default, the options are enabled. They can be disabled by setting them to false in the configuration file, or using the corresponding command line flags.

plugins: [
    [
      "@edno/docusaurus2-graphql-doc-generator",
       {
        schema: "./schema/swapi.graphql",
        rootPath: "./docs",
        baseURL: "swapi",
        homepage: "./docs/swapi.md",
        docOptions: {
          pagination: false, // disable buttons previous and next, same as cli flag --noPagination
          toc: false, // disable page table of content, same as cli flag --noToc
        },
      },
    ],
  ],

Plugin Loaders

Starting version 1.5.0, docusaurus2-graphql-doc-generator only provides graphql-file-loader document loader out-of-the-box. Thus, by default, the schema default loading expects a local GraphQL schema definition file (*.graphql).

However, this behaviour can be extended by installing additional GraphQL document loaders (see full list).

If you want to load a schema from a URL, you first need to install the package @graphql-tools/url-loader into your Docusaurus project:

yarn add @graphql-tools/url-loader

Once done, you can declare the loader into docusaurus2-graphql-doc-generator configuration:

plugins: [
  [
    "@edno/docusaurus2-graphql-doc-generator",
    {
      // ... other options
      loaders: {
        UrlLoader: "@graphql-tools/url-loader"
      }
    },
  ],
],

You can declare as many loaders as you need using the structure:

type className = string; // UrlLoader

type moduleName = string; // "@graphql-tools/url-loader"
type moduleOptions = { [option: string]: any };

type module = { 
  module: moduleName, 
  options: moduleOptions | undefined 
}

type loaders = {
  [className: className]: moduleName | module
}

Home Page

If you decide to use your own home page for the GraphQL generated documentation, then set the page ID to id: schema and the sidebar position to sidebar_position: 1:

---
id: schema
slug: /schema
title: Schema Documentation
sidebar_position: 1
---

This documentation has been automatically generated from the GraphQL schema.

Tip

If you want to hide it from the sidebar (like in the demo), then set the front matter sidebar_class_name (or className depending on your Docusaurus version) to navbar__toggle.

---
id: schema
slug: /schema
title: Schema Documentation
sidebar_position: 1
sidebar_class_name: navbar__toggle
---

Option diffMethod

The diffMethod is only used for identifying if the schema has changed. If a change is detected since the last documentation generation, then the full schema documentation will be generated.

Option groupByDirective

The groupByDirective is used to add grouping to the documentation to provide for an easier user experience to navigate. This is accomplished by adding a directive to all the types you want to have grouped.

For example, we have two mutations called addCourse and dropCourse, and we want to group them under a category called Courses.

We can accomplish this by adding a directive called doc with a field category to each mutation. Also, we can add a fallback option called Common which is for types that we don't explicitly add a directive to.

type Mutation{
  AddCourse(input: String): String  @doc(category: "Course") 
}

type Mutation{
  DropCourse(input: String): String  @doc(category: "Course") 
}

It can be set either with the command line flag -gdb:

npx docusaurus graphql-to-doc -gdb "@doc(category|=Common)"

or the plugin configuration groupByDirective:

plugins: [
  [
    "@edno/docusaurus2-graphql-doc-generator",
    {
      // ... other options
      groupByDirective: {
        directive: "doc",
        field: "category",
        fallback: "Common", // default is Miscellaneous
      }
    },
  ],
],

Troubleshooting

Duplicate "graphql" modules cannot be used at the same time

Add a resolutions entry to your package.json file:

"resolutions": {
  "graphql": "15.5.2"
}

Unable to find any GraphQL type definitions

Try changing the temporary folder for the plugin by setting tmpDir: "./.docusaurus" (see options section for more details).

You can also disable the schema diff feature by setting diffMethod: "NONE".

Unable to find any GraphQL type definitions for the following pointers

This error may occur when upgrading to version 1.5.0 or above.

Install and declare the missing GraphQL document loader package, see Loaders.

If the error persists, check that you have the correct class name in the configuration declaration.

Contributions

Contributions, issues and feature requests are very welcome. If you are using this package and fixed a bug for yourself, please consider submitting a PR!

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