SignalShelf · Developer documentation

GitHub · contributions

Read a user’s public contribution calendar. GET /api/v1/github/contributions accepts your x-api-key header. This endpoint returns live public data; demo mode is unavailable.

Request parameters

Returns the daily counts shown on the user’s public GitHub contribution graph for the requested year. This calendar is not a complete event feed.

ParameterTypeRequiredDescription
handlestringNoPublic GitHub username; no URL.
urlstringNoPublic https://github.com/<login> profile URL.
yearintegerNoCalendar year to read. Default: 2026. Range: 2008–2100.
freshnessstringNo24h (default), 1h, 7d, or live. Accepted cache hits are free; live forces refresh except simultaneous requests may share newly fetched data.

Code examples

Set SIGNALSHELF_BASE_URL and SIGNALSHELF_API_KEY on your server.

REQUEST EXAMPLE
curl "$SIGNALSHELF_BASE_URL/api/v1/github/contributions?" \
  -H "x-api-key: $SIGNALSHELF_API_KEY"

Response and pagination

The response contains data and meta. data includes platform, resource, sample:false, provider, and the public source payload. Lists return data.items; individual resources return data.data.

The response includes data.total, period_start, period_end and daily calendar entries with date, contributions and source intensity level. It represents the public calendar as rendered by GitHub, not a complete activity event feed.

meta includes event_id, mode, cache, credits_charged, fetched_at, age_seconds, and duration_ms. A fresh successful result costs one credit; accepted cached results and failures cost zero.

Availability and failures

Implementation is not a continuous availability guarantee. Source rate limits, retention, deleted content, restrictions, and regional availability apply. This is an independent SignalShelf contract, not a drop-in competitor response format.

400: invalid parameters. 401: missing/revoked key. 402: insufficient credits. 404: missing public resource. 429: SignalShelf throttle. 502/503: upstream failure or rate limit, with credit restored.

Explore the API in your workspace. Sample results and accepted cache hits cost zero credits. Open the playground →