Sift

Sift is a native macOS Git diff viewer — a fast desktop app for reviewing local commit, branch, and working-tree diffs in a clean, GitHub-style Files changed view. Open any repository, switch branches, leave inline review comments, and route them straight to your coding agent over MCP.

Built as a Tauri v2 app: a lightweight Rust backend (git orchestration + live file-watching + an MCP server) serving a React frontend inside a native window.

Features

• 📂 Open any repo — native folder picker (⌘O) + an Open Recent menu
• 🔀 Branch aware — see the current branch and switch with a real git checkout (guarded against a dirty tree)
• 🟢 Uncommitted by default — opens on HEAD → working tree, with an Include Untracked toggle so new files show up too
• ↔️ Split / Unified views with word-level intra-line highlighting and syntax highlighting
• 🔄 Auto-reload — the diff refreshes itself the moment you commit, stage, or edit files (FSEvents → SSE)
• 📝 Rendered previews by default — Markdown renders as a live preview, and HTML files open in a sandboxed web-view preview (like a browser) — flip back to the raw diff anytime
• 🖼️ More viewers — images, notebooks, and Mermaid diagrams
• 💬 Review comments — inline threads, copy-as-prompt, or route them to an AI agent (below)
• 🤖 MCP for coding agents — expose your comments to Claude Code, Codex, or any MCP client
• 🌗 Light / dark toggle, viewed-file tracking, keyboard navigation
• 💾 Persistent — runs on a fixed local port, so comments, viewed state, and settings survive restarts

Route review comments to your coding agent (MCP)

Sift runs a built-in MCP server (Streamable HTTP) so a running coding agent can fetch the review comments you post in the app, act on them, and mark them resolved. Works with any MCP-capable agent:

Claude Code

claude mcp add --transport http sift http://127.0.0.1:4966/mcp

Codex (~/.codex/config.toml)

[mcp_servers.sift]
url = "http://127.0.0.1:4966/mcp"

Then ask your agent to pull your comments. Tools exposed:

• list_review_comments — open comments for the current repo + diff (auto-marks them delivered)
• resolve_comment / reopen_comment
• get_review_context — current repo, branch, diff selection, and comment counts

Configure it in Settings → AI Routing: enable/disable, auto-deliver on read, scope (repo + diff view by default, or repo + branch, or repo), and whether to include outdated comments. The exact connect command (with the live port) is shown there too.

Develop

pnpm install
npx vite build                       # build the frontend (dist/client)
cd native && cargo tauri dev         # run the desktop app

Build the app

cd native && cargo tauri build --bundles app   # -> native/target/release/bundle/macos/Sift.app

Acknowledgements

Sift is a derivative work of difit by yoshiko-pg, used under the MIT License. difit's excellent GitHub-style diff-review UI is the foundation Sift is built on — Sift wraps it in a native macOS app with a Rust backend, live file-watching, branch switching, and MCP comment routing. Huge thanks to yoshiko-pg and the difit project. 🙏

License

MIT — see LICENSE. Copyright © 2025 @yoshiko-pg/difit and © 2026 AltSlate Labs.