Watcher API Changes

We recently changed the Watcher behavior
on GitHub. What used to be known as “Watching” is now “Starring”. Starring is
basically a way to bookmark interesting repositories. Watching is a way to
indicate that you want to receive email or web notifications on a Repository.

This works well on GitHub.com, but poses a problem for the GitHub API. How do
we change this in a way that developers can gracefully upgrade their
applications? We’re currently looking at rolling out the changes in three
phases over an extended period of time.

Today we are announcing the first steps towards separate “Watching” and
“Starring” APIs.

New API Endpoints

There are some new Star endpoints for the API. Don’t fret, your
old Watch endpoints are still working. The new Watch endpoints
are available too. However, the paths use the internal “subscriber” and
“subscriptions” terms so they don’t clash with legacy apps using the Watch
endpoints.

We’ve detailed the slow transition of the Star and Watch endpoints,
which will help provide a smooth upgrade path.

Changes Blog

The API Developer site now has a Changes blog for upcoming breaking
changes. It also has a low volume Atom feed for subscriptions. If you
are developing tools on top of the GitHub API, you should keep up through this
blog, or the @GitHubAPI Twitter account.

Written by

Risk Olson

@technoweenie