The verdict, the evidence, the red flags, and how it's built. In plain English, before the README's pitch.
RepoLens is a Manifest V3 Chrome extension. Open a GitHub, GitLab, npm, or PyPI page and click the toolbar icon. RepoLens reads the repo, runs it past the AI provider you picked, and opens a tab that leads with a straight answer: should you use this? You see the verdict before any of the README's pitch.
Stars tell you a project is popular. They don't tell you whether it fits your problem. RepoLens answers the question you have: should I use this, and what am I signing up for?
A scan opens to a verdict landing and fans out into focused tabs:
| Tab | What it does | |
|---|---|---|
| ⚖️ | Verdict | Fit call (strong / solid / care / risky), a one-line bottom line, measured facts, and the top things worth noting — first thing you see. |
| 🧠 | Deep Dive | The core concepts → how they build on each other → a plain-English ("explain it like I'm five") walkthrough. Optionally grounded by measured facts from the local runner. |
| 📚 | Library | Every repo you've analyzed, as a sortable / filterable triage grid with fit chips, a stats bar, bulk multi-select delete, and one-click Export / Import / Backup. |
| 🗂️ | Triage & decide | Keyboard-first Adopt / Trial / Hold / Reject, a Tech Radar, Boards, fit-delta tracking, notes, and daily drift alerts when repos go stale. |
| ★ | Evaluate & compare | Score repos 1–5 against your own rubric, grade docs A–F, and put any 2–10 side-by-side in a decision matrix (CSV / Markdown export). |
| 🔍 | Discover | Search GitHub from inside the extension, or get recommendations from the repos you've already adopted. |
| 🕸️ | Connections | A walkable map centred on the current repo, showing how it relates to the others you've scanned. |
| 🤝 | Synergies · Versus · Combinator | Complements, head-to-heads, and fused project ideas — grounded in your library. |
| 🗺️ | Canvas | Turn a repo's Deep Dive into an interactive, draggable Blueprint — pan/zoom the architecture map, take a narrated Guided Tour in dependency order (keyboard-navigable, reduced-motion safe), and export to .excalidraw or SVG. Switch the Library into a Corkboard to map your whole collection at once: every scanned repo a draggable card, related repos joined by colored string (alternatives, synergies, head-to-heads, combined ideas), colored by fit, filterable by Collection, arrangement saved. And the Tech-Stack Builder renders its wiring on the same canvas as a Stack Studio. |
Plus SKTPG (a one-tap State / Known-pitfalls / Trajectory / Proof / Growth read), framework lenses, and capability re-tagging.
First run: Vee, the lens mascot, walks you through a seeded demo repo (Library, then Verdict, then Blueprint) with a short coachmark tour. After about five real scans, a second power tour shows you the cross-library tools: Ask, Corkboard, multi-select compare, Radar, and Discover.
Newest first — the highlights. Full, detailed notes live in the changelog.
- 🚀 Instant scan feedback. Clicking RepoLens opens the loading tab immediately, checks cache/provider setup in parallel, and shows a more playful staged scan loader.
- 🫀 Long-scan heartbeat. Slow-but-alive provider calls no longer fail at a fixed 90 seconds; RepoLens waits while the background scan is still reporting progress.
- ✨ Smoother app feel. Scan tabs preserve scroll, transition more softly, avoid loading-card flicker, and large Library grids scroll more cheaply.
- 🧭 Structured scan schema. Scans now include a mental model, risk register, adoption simulation, and learning path, with fallbacks for old results.
- ✅ Decision-grade Verdict. Scans now produce a best next action, confidence, evidence, and a 30-minute trial plan.
- 🎨 DESIGN.md theme pack. Six new CSS-only looks: Command Blue, Aubergine Trace, Emerald DB, Paperline, Toybox Red, and Gradient Aurora.
- 🫧 Liquid Glass theme. A CSS-only theme inspired by
liquid-dom's glassy WebGPU look, without adding its runtime, flags, or dependencies. - 🔄 Live model lists. Gemini, OpenRouter, and Nous load their current provider catalogs in Settings, so new models and renamed slugs show up without another hand edit.
- 🧠 Gemini Ultra-ready, stable by default. The Google picker uses your API key to show the Gemini models your account can actually call, while fresh scans fall back to stable Gemini 2.5 unless you opt into newer IDs.
- 🔓 Sign in with Claude. Anthropic now supports the same Claude Code / Pi OAuth flow, while still accepting a Console API key.
- 🧭 Safer routing and scan recovery. Legacy saved model IDs are normalized before calls, OAuth-only providers count as connected, scans keep the MV3 worker warm, and IndexedDB blocked-upgrade hangs now surface cleanly.
- 🗺️ Blueprint Canvas. Turn a Deep Dive into a draggable, pannable architecture map with dependency-order Guided Tour.
- 🧵 Corkboard. Switch the Library into a saved red-string board of scanned repos and their relationships.
- 🧱 Stack Studio. Render Tech-Stack Builder outputs as a living wiring diagram with gaps and integrations.
- 📤 Exports. Save canvas views as
.excalidrawor SVG, with arrangements preserved in backups.
A correctness, security, and tooling pass from a full code audit — fixes only, no feature changes.
- 🔒 Hardened. Batch-scan output is now HTML-escaped (XSS), the manifest declares an explicit CSP, and the shared escaper covers single quotes too.
- 🐞 Squashed. Fixed a "Compare" modal crash, made the daily stale-repos drift alert actually fire (it was reading the wrong field), and stopped two loaders from pulsing under reduced-motion.
- ♿ Contrast. Faint label text on the light themes now meets WCAG AA.
- 🧰 Tooling. Reconciled the version across manifest / package.json, and switched CI to
npm ciwith a blocking lint gate + a dependency audit. 733 tests green.
- 🗂️ Collections ("Boards"). Group the repos you're evaluating together and filter the Library by board — with live counts, per-card membership dots, and a one-click assignment popover. Boards travel in your library export/import.
- Meet Vee, an optional lens mascot that reacts to your scans: scanning, wide-open on a strong fit, narrowed on a risky one, resting on an empty library. One theme-aware SVG, reduced-motion safe. Turn it off in Options → Interface.
- ✨ Subtle motion, everywhere it helps — tactile press states, a staged tab reveal, a verdict health-bar fill, a smoother toast and modal — all respecting reduced-motion.
- 🧭 Errors that tell you what to do — a failed scan now offers Open Settings (bad key / wrong model) or Retry (transient), and the loading copy names the provider it's actually using.
- 🔑 Console API key support for Claude. This release made the reliable
sk-ant-api…path explicit. Current builds also support the Claude Code / Pi OAuth flow again, so you can choose sign-in or a key. - 🆓 Want $0? Use local Ollama (no key) or Gemini's free tier — both already supported. See the How models & sign-in work guide.
- 🔓 Connect OpenAI without a key — Sign in with ChatGPT uses the same login the Codex CLI does: approve it on OpenAI's page and RepoLens handles the rest. Joins Claude (Claude Code login) and Grok (Grok CLI login) — the three big CLI sign-ins are now all here.
- ℹ️ Needs API access on your ChatGPT plan to mint the key. If it's not included, RepoLens says so and you can paste an API key instead. Your ChatGPT login stays on OpenAI's site — only tokens come back, and they never leave this browser.
Use almost any AI provider, not just the built-in five.
- ➕ 20+ providers built in — OpenAI, DeepSeek, Groq, NVIDIA NIM, Kimi, Zhipu GLM, Qwen, MiniMax, Azure OpenAI, and more.
- 🖥️ Run the AI locally — use Ollama on your own machine, with no key at all (only the AI step is local; RepoLens still reads the repo page online).
- 🔌 Any service — a Custom option connects almost any other AI provider: paste the address it gives you, pick the format, done.
- ✅ One-click tests — Test connection and Test function tell you a provider really works before you rely on it.
- 🔑 Each provider keeps its own key, stored only in your browser — switching never loses your other setups.
- 🗂️ Select multiple repos in the Library and delete them in one confirmed action (or Select all). Esc to back out.
- 🎨 5 new themes — Nord, Gruvbox, Rosé Pine, Catppuccin Latte, Solarized Light. Current builds include even more, including Mono Ink and Liquid Glass.
- 💡 Light themes fixed — no more dark patches bleeding through; every theme now reads crisp and clear, light or dark.
- 💾 Back up your library — export everything (repos, connections, history) to one file and import it on any machine.
- 🔐 Settings backup that never leaks your keys — your preferences travel; your API keys stay put.
- 🔎 Smarter search, 🔁 auto-retry when a provider hiccups, and ♿ accessibility (focus rings, reduced motion) across the board.
toolbar click
→ fetch repo metadata + README (GitHub / GitLab / npm / PyPI)
→ AI provider of your choice (with smart fallback)
→ structured analysis (verdict, evidence, risk register, learning path, …)
→ saved to your in-browser library
→ rendered as a verdict-first tab
No RepoLens account. No backend. Your keys, your machine.
Bring your own provider. Five are first-class: Claude (Claude Code / Pi OAuth or Console API key), Grok (OAuth or key), OpenRouter (OAuth), Gemini (API key with live model list), and Nous (API key with live model list). They fan out across a smart fallback chain: RepoLens tries them in order and drops to the next if one errors, so a single key is enough to start.
Nous (Nous Research) → Gemini → OpenRouter → Grok → Anthropic
On top of those, RepoLens works with almost any other AI service through one registry: OpenAI, DeepSeek, Groq, NVIDIA NIM, Kimi (Moonshot), Zhipu GLM, Qwen (Aliyun), Xiaomi MiMo, Volcengine Ark, Ollama Cloud, MiniMax, Azure OpenAI, local Ollama (no key needed), and a universal Custom endpoint. Each keeps its own key (switching never loses data), has a model picker, an optional endpoint override, and built-in connection / function self-tests. Gemini, OpenRouter, and Nous refresh their model pickers from the provider APIs, and every picker still has Custom… for a brand-new model ID. Connect just one and it works. It joins the fallback chain automatically.
CLI-style sign-ins. Anthropic uses the same Claude Code / Pi OAuth flow, OpenAI offers the Codex-style Sign in with ChatGPT, and xAI uses the Grok device flow. If a plan does not expose API access through OAuth, paste that provider's API key instead.
Local-only? Point at Ollama on
localhost. No key, no cloud. (Spawning a local CLI binary likeclaude/codexstill isn't possible: a browser extension is sandboxed and can't launch a program. But it can do those CLIs' OAuth logins, and talk to a local HTTP model server like Ollama.)
Each provider has a model dropdown (★ marks the recommended pick), and you can route each part of a scan to a different model:
Core scan → Claude Opus 4.8 for the deep judgment. Re-tag → a cheap, fast model. Deep Dive → whatever you like.
Any per-part pick still falls back to the full chain if that provider errors or isn't connected, so nothing can dead-end. Set it all in Options → More model providers and Models per scan part.
Your whole library lives in the browser (IndexedDB). No database, no daemon, no setup. It works the moment you load the extension, and it's Web-Store-ready.
Because it's your data, you can take it with you: Library → Export writes your whole library (analyzed repos, the semantic graph, and the local scan cache) to one portable JSON file, and Import restores it (merge or replace) on any machine. Backups are validated and bounded on import, so a bad file fails safe. Your settings travel too: Options → Back up your settings exports your theme, voice, model picks and per-part routing, but never your API keys.
Migrating from an old VelesDB server? Options → Import from VelesDB pulls your library across in one click.
First get the code — git clone the repo (or download the ZIP and unzip it). Then:
chrome://extensions → Developer mode (top-right) → Load unpacked → select the folder
Then click the RepoLens icon on any repo page.
For contributors — if you just want to use RepoLens, you're done after Install above.
npm install # installs vitest + lint/format tooling
npm test # unit tests across the pure helpers
npm run test:watch
npm run test:coverage # v8 coverage for the pure modules
npm run lint # eslint (flat config)
npm run format:check # prettierCI (.github/workflows/ci.yml) runs the suite on every push and PR. Pure ES modules, no build step.
For Deep Dive grounded in measured facts (real file counts, languages, dependency graph, license, architecture, tests/CI, secret scan), run the companion Rust daemon — it downloads a repo's source and analyzes it statically (it never executes repo code). Requires Rust; from the runner directory:
cargo run --release -- serve # listens on localhost:9191The extension auto-detects it and the Deep Dive pill turns green. Without it, Deep Dive simply falls back to the README.
| Path | Responsibility |
|---|---|
background.js |
Service worker: scan orchestration, AI provider calls + per-part routing, store writes |
output-tab.{js,html} |
The result surface — verdict landing + every tab |
library.{js,html} · library-data.js |
The Library home + its pure row/sort/filter helpers |
store.js · store/ |
In-browser persistence (IndexedDB doc store, client-side search ranker, ego-graph builder) |
routing.js · models.js |
Per-part model routing + the provider × model catalog |
providers.js · options-providers.js |
OpenAI/Anthropic-compatible provider registry + the data-driven Settings cards (keys, models, endpoint override, self-tests) |
migrate/velesdb-import.js |
One-time import from a legacy VelesDB server |
runner.js |
Client for the optional Rust deeper-scan runner |
backup.js · store.js · cache.js |
Library Export / Import / Backup — versioned envelope, validated + bounded on restore |
safe-html.js |
One canonical HTML escaper + an injection-safe html\`template (replaces the old per-fileesc()` copies) |
errors.js · retry.js |
Provider-error ranking (surface the one fixable failure) + exponential-backoff retries |
tests/ |
Vitest unit tests for the pure helpers |
Built for people who read code before they trust it.