git-cinema

README du dépôt

🎬 git-cinema

Turn any git history into a film.

One command reads your repository and writes a single HTML file: directories grow into a living tree, files light up when they're added, changed or deleted, and every contributor flies around the codebase firing at the files they touch. Hit Record and you get a 1080p MP4 to post.

git-cinema playing three years of Vite history

▶ Watch it live: Express, 17 years · Vite, last 3 years

Quick start

git clone https://github.com/CedricPoint/git-cinema.git
node git-cinema/git-cinema.js path/to/your/repo --open

Requires Node.js 18+ and git. Zero dependencies, nothing to install.

  🎬 express: 5,637 commits, 383 contributors, 903 files, 2009→2026
  → express-cinema.html (0.2 MB, 184 ms)

Or put it on your PATH with cd git-cinema && npm link, then run git-cinema in any repository.

What you see


🌳 The tree	Every directory is a node, every file a dot colored by language, arranged around its folder. The layout is a live physics simulation, so the project visibly grows, splits and gets reorganised.
✨ The pulses	Green flash for a new file, amber for a change, red for a deletion (the file then fades away).
☄️ The contributors	Each author is a glowing comet that flies to the files of each commit and fires beams at them.
📊 The HUD	Date, commit count, live files, top contributors and language breakdown, all drawn into the video.

The player

Key
`space`	play / pause
`←` `→`	seek
`+` `−`	speed (0.25× to 8×)
`L`	toggle labels
`S`	save a PNG snapshot
● Record 1080p	replays the film from the start and downloads it as MP4 (H.264) where the browser supports it, WebM otherwise

By default the whole history plays in about 80 seconds, and long quiet periods are skipped.

Options

git-cinema [repo] [options]

  -o, --out <file>      Output HTML file (default: <repo>-cinema.html)
  --since <when>        Only commits after this date, e.g. "2 years ago"
  --until <when>        Only commits before this date
  --max-commits <n>     Keep the most recent n commits (default: 30000)
  --title <text>        Title shown in the film (default: repository name)
  --exclude <glob>      Hide paths (repeatable), e.g. --exclude "docs/**"
  --anonymize           Replace author names with "Dev 1", "Dev 2", …
  --include-bots        Keep commits from bots (dependabot, renovate, …)
  --open                Open the film in your browser when done

Good to know

Private code stays private. The HTML contains file paths, author names and commit dates. Never file contents, emails or commit messages. Use --anonymize to drop names too, and --exclude to hide paths.
One person, several emails? Authors are merged by name and by email, and .mailmap is respected.
Bots are skipped by default, so Renovate doesn't steal the show.
Renames play as the file leaving one folder and appearing in another.
Shallow clones start with a big bang: everything that existed at the shallow boundary appears in the first frame.
node_modules, vendor, dist, build and similar folders are hidden.

How it works

git log --reverse --name-status -M is parsed into a compact timeline: a table of paths, a table of authors, and each commit stored as [time, author, [path × 4 + kind]]. Express's 17 years fit in 200 KB.
That timeline is embedded in player.html, a canvas renderer with a spring/repulsion layout (spatial hashing keeps it fast with thousands of directories), pre-rendered glow sprites and a percentile-based camera.
Recording uses canvas.captureStream() and MediaRecorder at a fixed 1920×1080, so the video doesn't depend on your window size.

Credits

Inspired by the legendary Gource. git-cinema is an independent take that needs no install and runs in any browser.

License

MIT