May 2023 Summaries

Apollo, a popular open-source framework for building high-performance data-driven applications, has released new updates and features in May 2023. A new course is available on the Odyssey platform to help users expand their existing supergraphs. The Apollo Client team will be hosting office hours where users can ask questions about the client. Meanwhile, several frontend frameworks have received updates, including Apollo Client (web) version 3.8.0, which brings a new feature called `useSuspenseQuery`, and Apollo Kotlin version 4.0, which is now in alpha. The Apollo Router has also been updated with improvements to coprocessors, query plan caches, and federated fragments. Additionally, the community spotlight highlights a recent blog post by Florian Fuchs at HashNode about how to hide certain schema pieces from introspection using custom directives and plugins.

The Apollo GraphQL community is committed to providing a welcoming environment for developers, with multiple channels available for getting help and sharing knowledge. The client teams maintain a Discord server where users can ask questions and receive live streams from Apollonauts, as well as a forum powered by Discourse. For feature requests and bug reports, users are directed to specific GitHub repositories or the relevant client library's repo. To get the most out of the community, users are advised to search existing issues first, share as many details as possible about their inquiry, including code samples, and follow the Code of Conduct. The community is also open to suggestions for improvement from users.

ApolloGraphOS Enterprise is now available for a self-service trial to the developer community, allowing them to experience its features and capabilities without committing to a purchase. The first alpha of Apollo Kotlin version 4 has been released, providing developers with an early opportunity to try out this new feature. A recent office hours livestream was recorded and made available on the blog post, covering topics such as Apollo Client. Additionally, the latest release of Apollo Router v1.19.0 includes improvements in CPU usage, memory utilization, and other features, while also supporting Federation 2.4.5 with updated query planner improvements. Upcoming events include a GraphQL summit sessions announcement, a livestream about using Apollo Client with Next.js 13's App directory, and a tech talk on customizing the Router.

The text discusses the Apollo Kotlin project, a library for building GraphQL APIs in Kotlin. The main topic is the normalized cache feature, which allows developers to easily manage data and reduce boilerplate code. Martin Bonnin, the maintainer of Apollo Kotlin, explains how the cache works and its benefits. He also answers questions from Jeff Auriemma about the project's history, its relationship with other languages like Java, and its plans for future development. The conversation covers various topics related to GraphQL, caching, and performance optimization, providing insights into the design decisions behind Apollo Kotlin.

We've published a new blog post discussing the use of Apollo Client with Next.js 13, which now supports the app folder directly. We've also rebuilt graphql.com to make it easier for users to learn GraphQL and completed the GraphQL validation specification in Rust's apollo-rs team, releasing the compiler as version 0.9.0. Meanwhile, we're hosting a livestream on May 24th to discuss integrating Apollo Client with Next.js 13 and have announced GraphQL Summit Workshops, which are now available for registration. Additionally, our community is growing, with notable mentions of the Rust-based GraphQL Compiler project by Robert Balicki at the Tokyo Rust Meetup.

This experimental library, `@apollo/experimental-nextjs-app-support`, is designed to simplify the use of Apollo Client with Next.js 13's App Router. The library provides a way to easily switch between Server Components and Client Components for rendering data from Apollo Client. It allows developers to create a centralized cache that can be shared across both types of components, ensuring consistent data updates and avoiding inconsistencies. The library also includes a `useSuspenseQuery` hook that makes it easy to fetch data from GraphQL servers in Next.js applications. With this library, developers can take advantage of the latest features of Apollo Client and Next.js 13 while maintaining a high level of performance and consistency in their applications.

Apollo has released three new versions of the Apollo Router since the last changelog, with a notable addition being a new preview feature for Enterprise users that allows them to configure operation limits to reject queries exceeding certain complexity metrics. This feature makes defense against denial-of-service attacks easier and is accompanied by a dedicated blog post. Additionally, GraphQL and Apollo have helped drive Reddit's mission by powering their iOS home feed and enabling the use of federation to build services in individual subgraphs. A new series called "office hours" has been launched where community questions are answered directly by Apollonauts, with upcoming streams focused on Apollo iOS and Kotlin. Recent releases include bug fixes and improvements for various Apollo products, including Apollo Client, Server, and iOS, as well as a new feature in Studio that allows users to quickly identify anonymous operations. The community has also been engaged through projects such as creating a Star Wars-themed GraphQL API, showcasing the potential of Amplification and its subgraph templates.

This is a summary of the text in one paragraph. The Apollo iOS team recently kicked off a new live series called "Office Hours" where they answer community questions about their library. In this episode, Jeff Auriemma and Anthony Miller discussed the major version bump from 0 to 1, which introduced a stable API that discourages anti-patterns. They talked about how the migration path was significant but worth it for future stability. The team also discussed the upcoming release of Apollo Kotlin and plans for future versions, including a major version bump to 2.0, which will bring significant changes to the networking APIs. Additionally, they addressed common questions and provided guidance on using custom scalars in GraphQL, which can be used to represent complex data types like dates or UUIDs. The team also shared some behind-the-scenes insights into their development process and thanked the community for their support.

Vivek Ravishankar of Apollo GraphOS is introducing a new feature to prevent misuse of GraphQL APIs by implementing operation size and complexity limits in the graph router itself, providing an additional layer of security for subgraphs, while also centralizing control over these limits across the entire federated graph. This feature allows users to limit the depth, height, number of root fields, and number of aliased fields of any incoming GraphQL operation, rejecting it if it exceeds any of the set limits with a 400 BAD_REQUEST status code, thus alleviating the burden of coordinating limits across every subgraph and making it easier to standardize policies for a large graph. The feature is available now in preview for all users with a GraphOS Enterprise plan, and detailed information about configuring limits can be found in the documentation for the `router.yaml` file.