gitopolis

A desktop toy: a 3D city that is a live view of a git repository.

Every tracked (or untracked-but-not-ignored) file is a building. File size sets height, directory sets district, uncommitted files wear scaffolding and a crane, and committing drops every crane at once. An in-game day runs in five real minutes, so the city has weather, traffic, lit windows and a night sky of its own.

Running it

npm install
npm run build                    # esbuild -> bundle.js, required before serving
node server.mjs ~/Desktop/dev    # then open http://localhost:4173

The argument is a root, not necessarily a repo: the server serves the root itself if it is one, plus every direct child that is one. So point it at your projects folder and switch between them from the dropdown in the top-left overlay — no restart.

node server.mjs .                # the current repo, the default
PORT=4180 node server.mjs ../foo # another port
npm run dev                      # rebuild on save
npm test                         # the derivation checks in test.mjs

Edit a file in the watched repo and its building grows a floor. Commit and every crane drops at once.

Why it works

The city is a pure projection of the working tree and is never persisted: restarting produces an identical city, and git checkout, rebase, amend and force-push all morph it for free. No assets either — every texture and mesh is generated at runtime.

See CLAUDE.md for the architecture.