gh-safeapprove

A GitHub CLI-compatible Python tool to safely auto-approve pull requests based on customizable rules.

🧩 What is gh-safeapprove?

gh-safeapprove is a CLI tool designed to automate the approval of pull requests, but only when they meet strict safety criteria — such as matching a specific diff pattern, modifying only certain files, or passing a custom rule check.

It is ideal for teams who want to streamline the review of low-risk, repetitive changes (e.g., version bumps, URL rewrites, comment-only diffs) without compromising code quality.

🚀 Installation

Prerequisites

• Python 3.8 or higher
• GitHub CLI (gh) installed and authenticated

Install from PyPI

pip install gh-safeapprove

Install from source

# Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/danielmeint/gh-safeapprove.git
cd gh-safeapprove

# Install in development mode
pip install -e .

🛠️ Basic Usage

Phase 1 Features

Currently supports:

• Reading PR URLs from a file or stdin
• Pattern matching on added lines using regex
• Dry-run mode for testing
• GitHub Enterprise support
• Basic authentication checks

# Approve all PRs listed in a file if their diffs only match the pattern
gh-safeapprove --file prs.txt --pattern '\\.url\\s*=' --dry-run

# Same via stdin
cat prs.txt | gh-safeapprove --stdin --pattern '\\.url\\s*='

# Using GitHub Enterprise instance
gh-safeapprove --file prs.txt --enterprise-host github.enterprise.com

Input Format

Create a file with PR URLs (one per line):

https://github.com/owner/repo/pull/123
https://github.com/owner/repo/pull/456
# Comments are ignored
https://github.com/owner/repo/pull/789

📋 Command Line Options

🔧 Development

Setup

# Install development dependencies
pip install -e ".[dev]"

# Run tests
pytest

# Format code
black src/ tests/
ruff check src/ tests/

Project Structure

gh-safeapprove/
├── src/
│   └── gh_safeapprove/
│       ├── __init__.py
│       ├── cli.py             # CLI entry point (typer)
│       ├── approver.py        # Main approval logic
│       ├── github_client.py   # Wrapper for `gh` CLI
│       └── utils.py           # Utility functions
├── tests/
├── pyproject.toml
└── README.md

🧪 Testing

# Run all tests
pytest

# Run with coverage
pytest --cov=gh_safeapprove

📝 License

MIT License - see LICENSE file for details.

🚧 Status

Phase 1 Complete: Basic functionality with pattern matching and GitHub CLI integration.

Planned for future phases:

• Advanced rule system
• File-scope rules
• GitHub API support
• GitHub Actions integration