Review

A desktop app that helps humans review diffs more efficiently.

Features

Local desktop app

Review runs as a native desktop app on your machine. It reads directly from your local git repo — no browser tabs, no network latency, no uploading diffs to a third party. File watchers reload automatically when your code changes on disk.

Trust patterns

Classify hunks into categories like imports:added or formatting:whitespace, then build a trust list to auto-approve entire classes of trivial changes. Focus your attention on the hunks that actually need human review. The taxonomy is extensible with custom patterns per project.

Multiple comparisons at once

Open the same repo in multiple tabs or windows, each with a different comparison (e.g. main..feature-a in one tab, main..feature-b in another). Each tab has its own independent review state. This isn't possible in most editors or web-based review tools.

Read-only by design

Review is for reviewing, not editing. You can't modify code from inside the app — and that's the point. When most of the code is written by AI or teammates, your job shifts from writing to evaluating. Review is built for that: approve, reject, or annotate changes without the distraction of an editor.

Symbol diffs

See which functions, classes, and methods are affected by each change, powered by tree-sitter. Navigate diffs at the symbol level instead of scrolling through raw line diffs. Supports 10+ languages.

Development

Prerequisites

• Node.js 18+
• Rust (latest stable)

Setup

scripts/install

Commands

scripts/install          # Install dependencies (npm + cargo + pre-commit hook)
scripts/dev              # Run in development mode with hot reload
scripts/test             # TypeScript type check + Rust tests
scripts/fix              # Auto-fix: prettier + cargo fmt
scripts/build            # Build production app

Architecture

graph TB
    subgraph Frontend["Frontend (src/)"]
        React["React + TypeScript + Vite"]
        subgraph Zustand["Zustand Store"]
            gitSlice["gitSlice"]
            filesSlice["filesSlice"]
            reviewSlice["reviewSlice"]
            classificationSlice["classificationSlice"]
            navigationSlice["navigationSlice"]
            preferencesSlice["preferencesSlice"]
        end
        React --> Zustand
    end

    subgraph Desktop["Desktop (src-tauri/)"]
        commands["commands.rs"]
        watchers["watchers.rs"]
        companion_server["companion_server.rs"]
    end

    subgraph Core["Core Library (review/)"]
        sources["sources/
        DiffSource trait
        LocalGitSource"]
        diff["diff/
        parser"]
        review["review/
        state, storage"]
        trust["trust/
        patterns, matching"]
        classify["classify/
        Claude API"]
        cli["cli/ (feature-gated)
        review"]
    end

    subgraph Storage["Storage"]
        git_review[".git/review/
        reviews/*.json
        custom-patterns.json"]
        tauri_store["Tauri Store
        (UI preferences)"]
    end

    React -->|"invoke()"| commands
    commands --> sources
    commands --> diff
    commands --> review
    commands --> trust
    commands --> classify
    watchers -->|"file system events"| React

    sources -->|"git operations"| diff
    diff -->|"hunks"| review
    trust -->|"pattern matching"| review
    classify -->|"Claude API"| trust

    review --> git_review
    preferencesSlice --> tauri_store

Loading

• Frontend: React + TypeScript + Vite (src/), state managed with Zustand
• Backend: Rust + Tauri (src-tauri/), classification via Claude CLI

Key Concepts

• Comparison - What you're reviewing (working changes, staged, branch diff)
• Hunk - A block of changes, identified by filepath:hash
• Trust Pattern - A label like imports:added that can auto-approve hunks
• Review State - Persisted in .git/review/reviews/

Extending

The DiffSource trait abstracts over the source of diffs. Currently implemented:

• LocalGitSource - Local git repositories

Future implementations could include:

• GitHubSource - GitHub API for PRs
• GitLabSource - GitLab API for MRs