The cookbook contains short, outcome-focused recipes. Use it when you already know the problem and want commands, interpretation guidance, and caveats in one place.
Who this page is for: everyday Compass users and integrators.
You will learn: which recipe fits your task and how cookbook pages differ from full guides and references.
Prerequisites: Getting started.
Reading time: 3 minutes.
| I need to… | Recipe |
|---|---|
| estimate the review surface of a symbol or change | Impact analysis |
| map a subsystem or request/data flow | Architecture discovery |
| generate and query graphs in CI | CI and automation |
| diagnose install, build, query, provider, or history trouble | Troubleshooting |
Each recipe follows:
Problem
what you are trying to accomplish
Commands
the smallest copyable workflow
Interpretation
what the result does and does not prove
Variations
common changes for nearby tasks
Safety / recovery
boundaries, failures, and cleanup
For a complete learning path, use a guide. For exact options and schemas, use the reference.
compass query "payment retry and idempotency"Then explain one concrete result:
compass explain RetryPolicycompass path ApiHandler PaymentRepositoryVerify each hop in source.
compass query --cql \
"MATCH (caller)-[:CALLS]->(target)
WHERE target.label = 'authorize_payment'
RETURN caller.id, target.id
ORDER BY caller.id
LIMIT 100"compass diff HEAD~1 HEADFor scripts:
compass diff HEAD~1 HEAD --format jsonFor an interactive reviewer report:
compass diff HEAD~1 HEAD --format html --output semantic-diff.htmlThe resulting standalone report combines the actionable semantic review, unified/split source diffs with an exact-patch fallback, and the changed code subgraph.
compass extract . --code-onlycompass history build HEAD --code-only
compass history export HEAD \
--format graph-json \
--output target/head-graph.jsonNext step: choose the recipe matching your current task and record the graph revision/profile beside any saved result.