review:required filter behaving differently with stacked pull requests

[toniperic]

🏷️ Discussion Type

Bug

Body

We have branch protection rules in place that protect the default branch, requiring:

• all changes to happen via pull requests
• at minimum 2 approvals for each PR
• requires review/approval from a code owner
• use of merge queues for all our merges

When looking at the definition of review:required, it says

matches pull requests that require a review before they can be merged.

So for a long time I've been using is:open user-review-requested:@me review:required query to get the list of PRs that I've been requested to review, and that still require a review/approval to get merged. Or in short – to get the list of PRs that need my attention now.

This is a very convenient filter, because if I was requested to review something but it already got enough approvals, such PRs will be filtered out as it doesn't need my attention, so it keeps the returned list smaller.

However, we have just recently started using stacked PRs, and I've noticed the review:required filter doesn't work the same there.

So currently I'm looking at a stack of PRs (sadly private repo, so can't share it), where the first PR in the stack already has enough approvals for it to be merged (but it's not merged yet) – it has 2, and both approvals come from code owners.

It even has the green "Enqueue pull request" button at the PR detailview page (which additionally verifies it can be merged immediately), but the is:open user-review-requested:@me review:required query is still returning this PR when I query GitHub, even though it doesn't really need my attention.

Curious is this a bug, or is this difference intentional?

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[slyyr]

I'd first separate the search filter's behaviour from the repository's branch protection rules.

A pull request can be subject to review requirements while also depending on another pull request in a stack. The base branch, mergeability, requested reviewers, and approval state can affect what appears actionable.

Try comparing the same query against a normal pull request and a stacked pull request. Record the base branch, review requests, current approvals, and whether each PR is still blocked by branch protection.

If the results differ, that comparison should help establish whether the filter is evaluating the review requirement itself or another state associated with the stacked PR.

A minimal reproducible example would be especially useful before concluding that the search filter is incorrect.

If this helps identify the cause, please mark this reply as the answer so other developers experiencing the same search behaviour can find the explanation!