devnull-stream

A devnull:// PHP stream wrapper for dev-null.sh: read, commit, reply, star, give pastéis and delete with PHP's plain file functions.

echo file_get_contents('devnull://@dseguy');                  // their commits, `git log` style
file_put_contents('devnull://@me', 'Hello from PHP!');        // a commit, signed with your SSH key
touch('devnull://@dseguy/commits/<id>/star');                 // a star

It has no dependency beyond PHP itself: requests go through PHP's native https:// stream and signatures through ssh-keygen.

Requirements

• PHP 8.5 or later, with allow_url_fopen enabled
• ssh-keygen from OpenSSH 8.2 or later, to write (reading needs nothing more)

Installation

composer require jubianchi/devnull-stream

The devnull:// wrapper is registered as soon as Composer's autoloader is loaded. Without Composer's autoloader, call Jubianchi\DevNull\StreamWrapper::register() yourself; registering twice is harmless.

Usage

Paths

Path	Read	Write	touch()	unlink()
devnull://@user	their commits	commits as you
devnull://@user/replies	their replies
devnull://@user/commits/<id>	one commit	replies to it		deletes it
devnull://@user/commits/<id>/star			stars it	unstars it
devnull://@user/commits/<id>/pasteis			gives it pastéis

devnull://@user and devnull://@user/replies are directories of commit ids; commits are files.

Read

echo file_get_contents('devnull://@dseguy');                  // their commits
echo file_get_contents('devnull://@dseguy/replies');          // their replies
echo file_get_contents('devnull://@dseguy/commits/<id>');     // one commit

print_r(scandir('devnull://@dseguy'));                        // their commit ids
var_dump(file_exists('devnull://@dseguy/commits/<id>'));
echo date('c', filemtime('devnull://@dseguy/commits/<id>'));

Commits read like git log:

commit 01a16807-1328-7241-b932-f19dd0286c13
Author: Seguy Damien <@dseguy>
Date:   2026-10-23T09:10:56Z
Stars:  3  Replies: 1

    After witnessing the frenzy around #PHP deploying its most recent fix…

Lists are paginated by the API: the next page is only fetched when the reader gets to it, so fgets(fopen('devnull://@dseguy', 'r')) costs a single request.

Commit and reply

Writes are signed with an SSH key of your GitHub account, as curl -fsSL dev-null.sh/commit | bash does: no sign-up and no token.

use Jubianchi\DevNull\StreamWrapper;

file_put_contents('devnull://@me', 'Hello from PHP!');                     // commit
file_put_contents('devnull://@dseguy/commits/<id>', "Let's do it!");       // reply

echo StreamWrapper::$lastResponse;                                         // link to what was created

The message is sent once, when the stream closes, so several fwrite() calls make a single commit:

$commit = fopen('devnull://@me', 'w');
fwrite($commit, "Shipped!\n\n");
fwrite($commit, 'devnull:// is out.');
fclose($commit);

StreamWrapper::$lastResponse is read-only outside the wrapper and holds '' when the last write failed.

Star, give pastéis and delete

These go through the signed API the mobile app uses, with a key approved as a device of your account (see Authorize a key).

touch('devnull://@dseguy/commits/<id>/star');       // star
unlink('devnull://@dseguy/commits/<id>/star');      // unstar
touch('devnull://@dseguy/commits/<id>/pasteis');    // give a pastel de nata
unlink('devnull://@me/commits/<id>');               // delete one of your commits

Errors

The wrapper never throws: like any stream, it raises a warning saying what went wrong and the file function returns false.

Warning: devnull: POST /api/v1/commits/<id>/star failed (HTTP 401): This key isn't approved for the /dev/null app. Sign in again in the app.
Warning: Write to devnull://@you to commit, or to devnull://@user/commits/<id> to reply, not to devnull://@me/replies.

Settings

Environment variable	Context option	Default
DEVNULL_URL	url	https://dev-null.sh; only https:// or local http:// URLs
DEVNULL_KEY	key	see Which key signs

Context options win over the environment:

$context = stream_context_create(['devnull' => ['key' => getenv('HOME').'/.ssh/id_devnull']]);

file_put_contents('devnull://@me', 'Signed with another key', 0, $context);

Authorize a key

Stars, pastéis and deletion need a key approved as a device, once:

vendor/bin/devnull authorize "My laptop"

It prints the account the key was approved for. The key is DEVNULL_KEY, or your SSH agent's first key.

With a code typed on the web

This is the intended flow, the device authorization grant for terminals. dev-null.sh doesn't offer it yet: it is proposed in dev-null-sh/dev-null.sh#585.

Open and approve:

   https://dev-null.sh/activate?user_code=WDJB-MJHT

or open https://dev-null.sh/activate and type the code WDJB-MJHT

Waiting for the approval…
Approved as a device of @you.

1. The command asks for a code with a request signed by the key to approve, and prints it with where to type it.
2. Open the link, sign in, check the code and approve.
3. Meanwhile the command asks every few seconds whether you approved, slowing down when the server says so. It stops if you deny the device or once the code expires, after 15 minutes.

With a link copied from the browser

When the server has no device authorization grant (its start endpoint answers 404, as dev-null.sh does today), the command falls back on the mobile app's sign-in:

1. The command prints a https://dev-null.sh/mobile/authorize?… link: open it, sign in and approve.
2. The page then sends your browser to a devnull://authorize?code=… link, which it cannot open. Copy that link from the address bar, or from the Location header of the approval's POST in the developer tools' Network tab, and paste it in the terminal.

The command redeems the code with a PKCE verifier only it knows, so the link is useless to anyone else.

How signing works

Private keys are never read: ssh-keygen -Y sign signs, from your key file or through your SSH agent, and the wrapper only reads public keys.

What	Endpoint	Namespace	Signed message
Commit, reply	POST /api/cli/commits	devnull-commit	<timestamp>\n<nonce>\n<reply to or empty>\n<body>
Star, pastéis, delete	the /api/v1 signed API	devnull-api	<timestamp>\n<nonce>\n<METHOD>\n<path and query>\n<JSON body>

The nonce is 32 random hexadecimal characters. The signature goes in the X-SSH-Signature header, as the bare base64 of the armored signature; the signed API also gets X-Devnull-Timestamp and X-Devnull-Nonce.

Which key signs

• DEVNULL_KEY (or the key context option) when set: a private key file, or a public key held by your SSH agent.
• Otherwise, to commit: the first Ed25519 or RSA key of your SSH agent or of ~/.ssh/*.pub that dev-null.sh finds on the GitHub account of one of its users (POST /api/cli/key-lookups, with public keys only).
• Otherwise, for the signed API: the first of those keys, since devices know nothing of GitHub.

Design

The stream wrapper is a thin adapter over a client, whose transport, signer and key discovery are ports, so that everything is tested without network. Device approval is a port too, with one strategy per flow, and its polling sleeps through a clock port, so that tests don't wait.

flowchart LR
    functions["file_get_contents(), fopen(), scandir(),<br>stat(), touch(), unlink()"] --> wrapper[StreamWrapper]
    cli[bin/devnull] --> app[Console\Application]
    wrapper --> path[Path]
    wrapper --> formatter[CommitFormatter]
    wrapper --> client[Client]
    app --> flow{{Authorization\AuthorizationFlow}}
    flow --> fallback[FallbackFlow]
    fallback --> devicecode[DeviceCodeFlow<br>RFC 8628]
    fallback -- "on 404" --> pkceflow[PkceFlow<br>RFC 7636]
    devicecode --> clock{{Clock\Clock}}
    devicecode --> client
    pkceflow --> client
    client --> transport{{Http\Transport}}
    client --> signer{{Signing\Signer}}
    client --> keys{{Keys\KeyRing}}
    transport --> native[NativeTransport<br>PHP https stream]
    signer --> sshkeygen[SshKeygenSigner<br>ssh-keygen -Y sign]
    keys --> local[LocalKeyRing<br>ssh-add -L, ~/.ssh/*.pub]
    native --> devnull[(dev-null.sh)]

Loading

StreamWrapper::useClientFactory() replaces how the wrapper builds its client, e.g. to plug another transport.

Development

composer install
composer test       # Pest; the signing tests use the real ssh-keygen and skip without it
composer analyse    # PHPStan, max level
composer lint       # Pint, dry run (composer fix applies it)

License

MIT