ghglance
Generate SVG cards summarizing a GitHub user's profile — written in Go.
ghglance is a single-binary CLI (and a GitHub Action wrapping it) that fetches
data for a GitHub user and writes a themed set of SVGs you can embed in your
profile README. The same binary can also run as a web UI
where anyone submits a username and gets the cards back.
Marketplace listing: ghglance · Source: tiennm99/ghglance
Cards rendered:
| # | Card | What it shows |
|---|---|---|
| 0 | Profile details | Login (Name) title + Octicon-labelled rows for company, location, link, join date (with age), followers/following, repo count |
| 1 | Repos per language | Donut + legend: how many owned non-fork repos use each language as primary |
| 2 | Most commit language (last year) | Donut + legend: last-year commits byte-weighted across each repo's language breakdown |
| 3 | Stats | Star, commit (lifetime + last-year), PR, issue, PR-review, contributed-to totals |
| 4 | Productive time (last year) | 24-hour bar chart with axes, title includes UTC±N.NN |
| 5 | Productive weekday (last year) | 7-bar day-of-week chart, peak day highlighted |
| 6 | Contributions (last year) | Smooth monthly area chart, Y-axis mirrored both sides, mm/yy labels |
| 7 | Contributions heatmap | Classic 7×53 calendar grid with theme-derived intensity ramp and legend |
| 8 | Top starred repos | Top 7 owned non-fork repos by ⭐, language dot + proportional bar |
| 9 | Streak | Current streak, longest streak, active days / total days with date ranges |
| 10 | Most commit language (all time) | Same as #2 but over lifetime commits |
| 11 | Productive time (all time) | Same as #4 but over lifetime commits |
| 12 | Productive weekday (all time) | Same as #5 but over lifetime commits |
| 13 | Contributions (all time) | Area chart across every active year, auto-thinned x-axis labels |
| 14 | Contributions by year | One bar per active year, peak year highlighted |
| 15 | Records (all time) | Six personal-best rows: peak day, peak month, first contribution, lifetime active days, account age, languages used |
Preview — dracula theme
Live render against the author's profile, committed by .github/workflows/demo.yml on every push to main. Rendered with start_of_week: monday so the heatmap rows and weekday bars start on Mon, and include_org_repos on so repos under the author's orgs count toward the repo and language totals. Other 64 themes in the demo gallery.
In the wild
- tiennm99/tiennm99 — author's profile README, refreshed daily via
tiennm99/ghglance@v1. Two-per-row layout, dracula theme.
Use as a GitHub Action (recommended)
Drop this in .github/workflows/ghglance.yml in your profile repo (the one
named after your username):
name: ghglance
on:
schedule:
- cron: "0 0 * * *" # daily
workflow_dispatch:
permissions:
contents: write
jobs:
cards:
runs-on: ubuntu-latest
steps:
- uses: actions/checkout@v5
- uses: tiennm99/ghglance@v1
with:
user: ${{ github.repository_owner }}
token: ${{ secrets.GHGLANCE_TOKEN }} # classic PAT with read:user + repo
themes: dracula,github_dark,tokyonight
tz: Asia/Saigon
include_forks: "true"
include_private: "true"
include_org_repos: "false" # "true" also counts org repos you administer (token needs read:org)
commit_changes: "true"
Then embed the cards in your README.md:
















Action inputs
| Input | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|
user |
— | GitHub username (required) |
token |
${{ github.token }} |
PAT with read:user + repo for private repo stats |
out |
output |
Output directory |
themes |
dracula |
Comma-separated theme ids, or all |
tz |
UTC |
IANA tz for the productive-time card (e.g. Asia/Saigon) |
start_of_week |
sunday |
First day of week for heatmap rows and weekday bars (sunday…saturday) |
top_repos |
0 |
Optional cap on seed repos probed for commit history (0 = unlimited) |
commits_per_repo |
500 |
Max commits sampled per repo, 0 = every commit (covers last-year and all-time aggregates) |
include_forks |
true |
Include forked repos in stats and commit probing |
include_private |
true |
Include private repos (requires PAT with repo scope; silently no-op otherwise) |
include_org_repos |
false |
Count org-owned repos you administer toward stars, repo count, languages, top-starred (needs read:org) |
commit_changes |
false |
Commit generated cards back to the repo |
commit_message |
chore: update ghglance cards |
Commit message |
commit_branch |
(current ref) | Target branch for auto-commit |
author_name |
github-actions[bot] |
Commit author |
author_email |
…@users.noreply.github.com |
Commit email |
Use as a CLI
go install github.com/tiennm99/ghglance@latest
Or build from source:
git clone https://github.com/tiennm99/ghglance
cd ghglance
go build -o ghglance .
Then:
export GITHUB_TOKEN=ghp_xxx
ghglance -user tiennm99 -themes dracula,github_dark -tz Asia/Saigon -out output
Add -include-org-repos to also count org-owned repos you administer:
ghglance -user tiennm99 -themes dracula -include-org-repos -out output
| Flag | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|
-user |
(required) | GitHub username |
-token |
$GITHUB_TOKEN |
Personal access token |
-out |
output |
Output directory (<out>/<theme>/…svg) |
-themes |
dracula |
Comma-separated theme ids, or all |
-tz |
Local |
IANA timezone for productive-time cards |
-start-of-week |
sunday |
First day of week for heatmap rows and weekday bars (sunday…saturday) |
-top-repos |
0 |
Optional cap on seed repos probed (0 = unlimited) |
-commits-per-repo |
500 |
Max commits sampled per repo, 0 = every commit |
-include-forks |
true |
Include forked repos in the stats |
-include-private |
true |
Include private repos (requires repo PAT scope; silently no-op otherwise) |
-include-org-repos |
false |
Count org-owned repos you administer toward stars, repo count, languages, top-starred |
-timeout |
30m |
Overall fetch deadline (per generation job under -serve), 0 = no limit |
-list-themes |
Print available theme ids and exit | |
-serve |
Run the web UI on this address (e.g. :8080) instead of generating once |
|
-data-dir |
data |
Web UI only: directory holding generated cards |
-cooldown |
6h |
Web UI only: minimum age of a user's cards before a token-less submission regenerates them |
-retention |
24h |
Web UI only: delete a user's cards this long after they were generated, 0 = keep forever |
-workers |
2 |
Web UI only: concurrent generation jobs |
The five web UI flags are server-only: the Action (action.yml,
entrypoint.sh) does not expose them.
Run the web UI
-serve turns the binary into a small web app: a form takes a GitHub
username plus options, a background job renders all sixteen cards in every
theme, and /u/<username> shows them again with a theme picker and
copyable embed URLs. Cards are stored on disk and survive restarts.
export GITHUB_TOKEN=ghp_xxx
ghglance -serve :8080 -data-dir data -retention 24h
# open http://localhost:8080
| Path | Serves |
|---|---|
/ |
The submission form |
/u/<user> |
The user's cards (?theme=<id> picks the theme), or job progress while one runs |
/u/<user>/<theme>/<card>.svg |
One card, embeddable in a README |
/u/<user>/status |
Job status as JSON, polled by the progress page |
/healthz |
Liveness probe |
How submissions are handled:
- Server token. Submissions without a token use the server's
GITHUB_TOKEN, with private repos and org repos forced off. That alone does not hide private work: GitHub counts every private contribution a token can see in the totals and the calendar. So the server token must be public-only (a classic PAT with justread:user, or a fine-grained token with public repositories only); a token withreposcope, or one that can list any private repository, is refused for token-less jobs and logged at startup. The token owner's own username is refused without a token too. - Submitter's token. An optional token in the form is used for that one
job, then dropped: never logged, never written to disk. When it belongs to
the username being generated, private repos count by default and the
cooldown is skipped. A token that belongs to someone else renders public
data only, does not skip the cooldown, and is refused outright if it can
read private repositories. The cards it renders are public on the site
like any other.
A "Create a token on GitHub" button beside the field opens GitHub's
new-token page with a classic token's
repoandread:userscopes pre-ticked. - Failures. A job that fails or times out at any fetch stage publishes nothing, so an earlier complete set stays in place.
- Cooldown. Without a token, cards younger than
-cooldownare shown instead of regenerated. - Retention. Cards are deleted
-retention(default24h) after they were generated, checked at startup and hourly. The user's page then offers a fresh generation, and embedded card URLs return 404 until someone regenerates them. - Limits. One queued or running job per user,
-workersjobs at once,-timeoutper job, and five submissions per client followed by one every two minutes. A client is an IPv4 address or an IPv6 /64. Behind a reverse proxy on a private or loopback address, the client address comes from the lastX-Forwarded-Forhop.
Each user takes about 9 MB on disk for an active profile (16 cards × every theme).
Deploy with Docker Compose or Coolify
compose.yml builds the repo's Dockerfile, runs
ghglance -serve :8080 -data-dir /data, keeps cards in the ghglance-data
volume, and health-checks /healthz. It publishes no host port: Coolify's
proxy routes the domain it generates for SERVICE_FQDN_GHGLANCE_8080 to
port 8080 in the container.
In Coolify:
- Create a resource from this Git repository with the Docker Compose
build pack and compose file
/compose.yml. - Set
GHGLANCE_TOKEN(see.env.example) to a public-only token: a classic PAT with onlyread:user, neverrepo.compose.ymlrequires it and passes it to the container asGITHUB_TOKEN. The distinct name keeps aGITHUB_TOKENexported in your shell from silently replacing it duringdocker compose up. - Keep the generated domain or set your own on the
ghglanceservice, then deploy.
On a plain Docker host, copy .env.example to .env, fill in the token,
add a ports: ["8080:8080"] entry to the service, and run (.dockerignore
keeps .env and data/ out of the image context):
docker compose up -d --build
The Action image is unchanged: compose.yml overrides the entrypoint, so
the Action still runs entrypoint.sh.
How attribution works
Repo sampling uses a seed list built from contributionsCollection.commitContributionsByRepository, unioned across every active contribution year. This catches every repo you've committed in — not just your top-starred ones. Each year is queried a quarter at a time: the API caps that field at 100 repos per query and drops the rest without saying so, which a prolific year hits easily. A quarter that still comes back at the cap is re-asked month by month to recover the tail.
Which repos count where. The commit-driven cards (most-commit-language, productive time, productive weekday, and everything derived from the contribution calendar) cover repos in any namespace you committed to — your own, your orgs', and upstream repos you sent PRs to. The repo-driven cards (stars, repo count, repos-per-language, top-starred) look only at repos you own. Set include_org_repos / -include-org-repos to also count org-owned repos where your permission is ADMIN; org repos you merely have read or write access to are never counted.
Commit-to-language is byte-weighted: each commit credits every language in the repo, proportional to linguist's byte share. A commit to a 60% Go / 40% Python repo adds 0.6 to Go and 0.4 to Python, regardless of which file was touched. Caveats:
- Linguist excludes prose (Markdown, AsciiDoc, reST) from byte counts, so heavily-Markdown repos skew toward whatever small code fraction linguist did detect.
- For per-file accuracy, a future
-accurate-languagesmode is planned (per-commit REST + go-enry).
Cost per run (current defaults, typical user):
- ~1 profile query + ~4 queries per active year (+3 for any quarter that saturates) + ~50 commit-history pages ≈ 80-100 GraphQL calls.
- Zero REST calls. Well under the 5000 points/hr budget.
Themes
Run ghglance -list-themes for the full list (65 themes ported from
github-profile-summary-cards). Built-ins include default, dark, dracula,
github, github_dark, tokyonight, onedark, nord_dark, nord_bright,
gruvbox, radical, synthwave, monokai, solarized, solarized_dark,
transparent, and more. Preview every one against real profile data in the
demo gallery.
Output
output/
dracula/
profile-details.svg
repos-per-language.svg
most-commit-language.svg
stats.svg
productive-time.svg
productive-weekday.svg
contributions.svg
contributions-heatmap.svg
top-starred-repos.svg
streak.svg
most-commit-language-all-time.svg
productive-time-all-time.svg
productive-weekday-all-time.svg
contributions-all-time.svg
contributions-by-year.svg
records.svg
output/ is entirely gitignored — it's regenerated on each run. For a
reference render of every card in every theme, see the CI-built
demo/ gallery instead.
Tokens & permissions
The default ${{ github.token }} can read public user data but will not see
your private-repo commits. For accurate stats, create a classic personal
access token with read:user and repo, save it as a repo secret (e.g.
GHGLANCE_TOKEN), and pass it via the token input. include_private
defaults to true so those commits are counted automatically once the token
has repo scope; pass include_private: "false" if you want to keep private
work out of the rendered cards even when the token can see it.
Enabling include_org_repos additionally needs read:org on the token, and
SSO authorization for any org that enforces it — otherwise those repos stay
invisible and the input silently changes nothing.
Credits & inspiration
- github-profile-summary-cards by @vn7n24fzkq — card layout, chart styles, theme palette, Octicon selection, and output structure.
License
Apache-2.0 — see LICENSE.