GitHub CLI reference for non-obvious behaviors

Requesting PR reviewers

gh pr edit --add-reviewer can fail with cryptic empty-string errors. Use the API directly instead:

gh api repos/{owner}/{repo}/pulls/{pr-number}/requested_reviewers \
  -f "reviewers[]=username"

Downloading workflow job logs

gh run view --log can be unreliable for large logs. Download job logs directly via the API and save to a file for searching:

gh api repos/{owner}/{repo}/actions/jobs/{job-id}/logs > /tmp/job.log

To get job IDs for a run:

gh run view {run-id} --repo {owner}/{repo} --json jobs --jq '.jobs[] | {name, id, status, conclusion}'

Downloading workflow artifacts

gh api repos/.../artifacts/{id}/zip > foo.zip can truncate large artifacts (≥1GB+) without erroring — the resulting file fails to unzip with "End-of-central-directory signature not found." Use gh run download instead, which streams the artifact correctly and unzips the outer wrapper for you:

gh run download {run-id} --repo {owner}/{repo} --name {artifact-name} --dir /tmp/out

The artifact's contents land directly in --dir (no outer .zip to unwrap). You still need to extract any inner .tar.gz/.zip payloads yourself.

Stacked pull requests with gh-stack

The github/gh-stack extension (gh extension install github/gh-stack) manages a local stack of branches and the corresponding stack of PRs. A few non-obvious details:

Adopting an existing branch into a new stack

If you already have a branch with work and an open PR, gh stack init without arguments errors out. Pass the branch name with -a/--adopt and the trunk with -b:

gh stack init -a --base dev nathan/dev/feature-one

This registers the existing branch as the bottom of a new stack rooted at dev without creating any new commits or branches.

Adding a new layer on top

gh stack add nathan/dev/feature-two

Creates a new branch based on the current stack top and checks it out. You can then commit, and later gh stack submit --auto will push all branches in the stack and open PRs with the correct base chain (e.g. feature-two → feature-one → dev).

Viewing the stack

gh stack view

Prints an ASCII diagram of the stack with current branch, PR number, commit sha, and trunk. Much more useful than git log --graph for stack navigation.

Navigating the stack

• gh stack down — check out the next branch toward trunk (parent in the stack).
• gh stack up — check out the next branch away from trunk (child in the stack).
• gh stack bottom / gh stack top — jump to the ends.

Pushing and syncing

gh stack submit --auto pushes every branch in the stack, creates or updates PRs on GitHub, and sets each PR's base to the branch below it. Safe to re-run after amending commits on any branch in the stack — it force-pushes the affected branches and leaves the untouched ones alone.

To re-sync without opening PRs:

gh stack push

Gotchas

• gh stack submit does not stage or commit anything — stage and commit with git first, then submit.
• After rebasing the bottom branch onto a new trunk sha, use gh stack rebase (not git rebase) to propagate the new base through every layer.
• If CI fails only on the top PR, the base PR still shows as mergeable — don't merge the base PR without checking the stack view first, because merging mid-stack orphans the upper layers.