Empty types are not allowed in schema language, even if they are later extended

[dallonf]

I just discovered this extend feature, which is super cool! My Query type had gotten massive and bloated and this looks like the perfect tool to break all of its fields out into many files.

The problem: now I don't want anything in the base Query definition, since every field that used to be there now feels more at home in another file. But if I have a definition that looks like this (obviously heavily simplified from my use case):

  type Query {}

  extend type Query {
    hello: String
  }

(Launchpad version: https://launchpad.graphql.com/13v9kk4n9)

I get the error: "Query fields must be an object with field names as keys or a function which returns such an object."

I would expect that an empty type would be OK if (and only if) there was another type somewhere in the schema that extended it.

As a workaround, I'm currently putting a dummy field in the root Query type.

[ashconnell]

related: #293

[dallonf]

Thanks for the link. Looks like this is a graphql-js concern (graphql/graphql-js#937), so I'll close this issue.

[janflyborg]

It looks like graphql/graphql-js#937 solved this in December 2017, so I think you should revisit this again. It is quite cumbersome to have to define dummy members just to support type weaving in large schemas that are splitted over several files

[dallonf]

@janflyborg This already works in the current version of graphql-tools! The syntax is type Query rather than type Query {}.

[janflyborg]

@dallonf I didn't know that. Thanks for the help, I'll try that.

[benoj]

So I know this is an old issue - but when I do @dallonf's solution I get an error "Type Query must define one or more fields."?

[dallonf]

So I know this is an old issue - but when I do @dallonf's solution I get an error "Type Query must define one or more fields."?

@benoj iirc, every type needs to have a field at least somewhere in the schema. So even if you define it as empty, you still need to extend it.

[Jccp1983]

I just discovered this extend feature, which is super cool! My Query type had gotten massive and bloated and this looks like the perfect tool to break all of its fields out into many files.

The problem: now I don't want anything in the base Query definition, since every field that used to be there now feels more at home in another file. But if I have a definition that looks like this (obviously heavily simplified from my use case):

  type Query {}

  extend type Query {
    hello: String
  }

(Launchpad version: https://launchpad.graphql.com/13v9kk4n9)

I get the error: "Query fields must be an object with field names as keys or a function which returns such an object."

I would expect that an empty type would be OK if (and only if) there was another type somewhere in the schema that extended it.

As a workaround, I'm currently putting a dummy field in the root Query type.