codefile 26.0.1

A CLI tool to bundle entire projects into a single AI-friendly context file.

codefile

A CLI tool that bundles an entire project directory into a single, structured text file — purpose-built for feeding codebases to LLMs like Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini, and Grok.

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How It Works

codefile walks your project root, respects your .gitignore, and writes every relevant file into one output file with a clear format: a metadata header, an ASCII directory tree, and each file's content wrapped in FILE_START / FILE_END sentinels with a SHA-256 fingerprint. Binary files, symlinks, and empty files are represented with inline markers instead of garbage content.

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Installation

pip install codefile

Requires Python 3.10 or later.

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Usage

# Pack the current directory
codefile

# Pack a specific directory
codefile /path/to/project

# Write output to a custom path
codefile /path/to/project -o context.txt

Options

Argument	Description
directory	Root directory to pack. Defaults to the current directory.
-o, --output	Output file path. Defaults to <directory>/CodeFile.txt.

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Output Format

ROOT_NAME        myproject
CREATED_UTC      2025-08-01T12:00:00Z
TOTAL_SOURCE_MB  0.42
FILE_COUNT       18

START_STRUCTURE
myproject/
|-- src/
|   |-- main.py
|   \-- utils.py
\-- README.md
END_STRUCTURE

FILE_START src/main.py a3f9c12b8e01
def main():
    print("hello")
FILE_END src/main.py a3f9c12b8e01

FILE_START assets/logo.png d7e2b45f9c33
BINARY_CONTENT
FILE_END assets/logo.png d7e2b45f9c33

Special Content Markers

Marker	Meaning
BINARY_CONTENT	File is binary (image, compiled object, etc.)
EMPTY_CONTENT	File exists but has zero bytes
SYMLINK_CONTENT	File is a symbolic link

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.gitignore Support

codefile implements a proper .gitignore parser, not just glob matching. The following pattern types are all handled correctly:

• Glob patterns — *.log, *.pyc
• Directory-only rules — build/, dist/
• Root-anchored rules — /.env, /config/secrets.json
• Deep glob — **/*.min.js
• Negation — !important.log re-includes a previously excluded file

Directories matched by an ignore rule are pruned immediately during the walk — node_modules/ or build/ with thousands of files are never descended into.

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Project Structure (src layout)

your-project/
├── src/
│   ├── codefile.py          ← main module
│   └── config/
│       └── version.txt      ← single source of truth for version
├── pyproject.toml
├── README.md
└── LICENSE

The version is read directly from src/config/version.txt at build time. To release a new version, update that file.

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License

MIT License — see LICENSE for details.

Author

Nolan Stark