Concepts
The handful of ideas both apps are built on.
Both apps are built on the same few ideas. Learn these once and both apps will make sense.
Repositories and workspaces
A repository is any git repository on your machine. Reviewer opens one at a time by default.
A workspace is several repositories opened side by side under one name, for example a web app and the API behind it. In a workspace, the file tree shows each repository as a folder, search reaches into all of them, and a commit across several repositories makes one commit in each. Workspaces are saved by the Reviewer server, so one made in the Mac app opens in the terminal app, and the other way round.
What you compare
Every review compares two versions of your code. You choose which:
| Comparison | Shows |
|---|---|
| Uncommitted changes | Your working tree against the last commit, untracked files included. |
| Against a branch | Everything since your branch left another branch (its merge base), through to the working tree. |
| A commit | What one commit changed. |
| A pull request | A GitHub pull request's changes. |
Reviewer remembers the branch you compared each branch against. The next time you open that branch, it opens on the same comparison.
Comments
A comment belongs to a line, and to the comparison you left it on. A comment left on your uncommitted work stays with your working tree. A comment left on a commit stays with that commit. This is what lets an agent find the exact line you meant, even after the code has moved.
Comments stay until they are resolved. When an agent fixes what a comment asked for, it resolves the comment and it disappears from the review.
The Reviewer server
Both apps rely on a small local server for git, files, comments and language
features. It listens on 127.0.0.1:41811. To use another port, set
REVIEWER_PORT.
You never start the server yourself. Whichever app opens first starts it, and any app that opens after that reuses it. The agent skill talks to the same server.
Where your data lives
Everything Reviewer keeps is in ~/.reviewer in your home folder:
| Path | Holds |
|---|---|
~/.reviewer/reviewer.db | Comments, run commands, layouts and settings. |
~/.reviewer/repos.json | The repositories found on your machine. |
~/.reviewer/server.log | The server's output, when the terminal app started it. |
Nothing is sent anywhere. The only network requests Reviewer makes are to GitHub when you work with pull requests, and to an agent's provider when you run an agent.