A TUI diff viewer with persistent annotations. Drop-in replacement for git diff with the ability to annotate code changes.

    .___.__  _____  _____             
  __| _/|__|/ ____\/ ____\___________ 
 / __ | |  \   __\\   __\/ __ \_  __ \
/ /_/ | |  ||  |   |  | \  ___/|  | \/
\____ | |__||__|   |__|  \___  >__|   
     \/                      \/       

• Git-compatible CLI (works like git diff)
• Interactive TUI with vim-style navigation
• Persistent annotations stored in SQLite (comment/todo + resolve)
• Expanded file view (full file, with changes highlighted)
• Side-by-side view and syntax highlighting
• Staging/unstaging hunks, discard hunk
• Sidebar with modified/added/deleted files
• Auto-reload via filesystem watcher
• Export annotations to Markdown/JSON for AI context

Requires Rust. Then:

cargo install differ_cli --locked

Binary is installed to ~/.cargo/bin as differ (ensure it’s in your PATH).

Or build locally:

./install.sh

Add to your ~/.gitconfig:

[alias]
    d = ! /path/to/differ diff
    ds = ! /path/to/differ diff --staged

Then use git d instead of git diff.

differ diff                    # unstaged changes (like git diff)
differ diff --staged           # staged changes (like git diff --staged)
differ diff HEAD               # working tree vs HEAD
differ diff main..feature      # between branches
differ diff HEAD~3..HEAD       # last 3 commits
differ diff -- src/            # filter by path

# In TUI: press 'a' to add annotation at current line

# CLI commands
differ add -f src/main.rs -l 42 "needs refactoring"
differ list
differ export                  # markdown to stdout
differ export -f json          # JSON format
differ clear                   # clear all annotations

Press ? in the TUI for the full list. Highlights:

• j/k, n/N, Tab/Shift+Tab, g/G for navigation
• x expand, c collapse, v side-by-side, B sidebar, b focus sidebar
• s stage/unstage hunk, D discard hunk (unstaged)
• a/e/d/r/t annotations (add/edit/delete/resolve/type)
• R reload, @ send annotation to AI

~/.config/differ/config.toml:

side_by_side = false
context_lines = 3
show_annotations = true
syntax_highlighting = true
ai_target = "claude" # or "codex"
watch_ignore_paths = [".git", "target", "_build", "deps"]

MIT