nit

Terminal diff viewer with inline review comments.

Navigate diffs with vim-style keybindings, leave comments on specific lines, and persist them as structured JSON. Useful for code review workflows, self-review before committing, and giving feedback to AI coding tools.

Install

brew install joshuazd/tap/nit

Or via pip/pipx:

pipx install nit-cli

Or from source:

git clone https://github.com/joshuazd/nit.git
pipx install ./nit

Usage

# Review current branch changes (vs main/master)
nit

# Review unstaged changes
nit --mode unstaged

# Review all uncommitted changes
nit --mode all

# Review a specific commit range
nit HEAD~3..HEAD
nit main..feature

# Review any file (read-only, no git required)
nit path/to/file.py

# Filter to specific files or directories
nit --path src/
nit --path src/nit/app.py main..feature

# Export comments on quit
nit --export-comments comments.md
nit --export-comments - --export-format json  # stdout as JSON

On main/master, nit defaults to unstaged mode. On feature branches, it defaults to branch diff. The diff auto-refreshes every 5 seconds.

Keybindings

Git operations (g-prefixed)

Comment Storage

Comments are saved to .nit.json at the root of your git repository. The format is structured JSON:

{
  "version": 1,
  "branch": "my-feature",
  "base": "main",
  "comments": [
    {
      "file": "src/app.py",
      "line": 42,
      "line_content": "    return result",
      "comment": "Should handle the empty case here",
      "hunk_context": ["...", "..."],
      "timestamp": "2025-01-15T10:30:00+00:00",
      "diff_mode": "branch"
    }
  ]
}

Add .nit.json to your global gitignore to keep comments local:

echo '.nit.json' >> ~/.config/git/ignore

Claude Code Integration

nit works as a review tool for Claude Code. Leave comments on Claude's changes using nit, then have Claude read them with /nit. This creates a feedback loop where you can guide Claude's work through inline code review.

Install the plugin

In Claude Code:

/plugin marketplace add joshuazd/nit
/plugin install nit

Then use /nit in any project to have Claude read and address your comments.

Local development

If you cloned the repo, you can test the plugin directly:

claude --plugin-dir /path/to/nit

Development

git clone https://github.com/joshuazd/nit.git
cd nit
pip install -e ".[dev]"
pytest

The ./nit bootstrap script auto-creates a virtualenv at ~/.local/share/nit/venv for quick local use without a manual install.

License

GPL-3.0 - see LICENSE for details.