Getting Started

This page gets you from a fresh install to your first commit and worktree in a few minutes.

Add your first project

Open the Projects panel and click Add project. There are five paths:

1. Detect — browse to a folder on disk. Loxel identifies whether it’s a bare repo, a regular repo, an existing worktree, or a non-repo folder.
2. Add — after detection, confirm to register the repo in loxel’s project list.
3. Clone — paste a remote URL. Choose single-workspace (regular clone) or multi-workspace (bare repo + first worktree) before confirming.
4. Init — initialize git in an existing folder that isn’t yet a repo. Same single/multi choice as Clone.
5. Convert — turn an existing regular repo into a bare repo with worktrees. Requires no uncommitted changes and no existing wt.yaml.

For most cases, Detect + Add is the fastest path. If you’re planning to run multiple parallel workstreams on the same repo, choose the multi-workspace option during Clone or Init — it sets up a bare repo from the start. See Worktrees & Projects for the full breakdown.

Panel layout overview

Loxel’s interface is divided into five areas:

• Left sidebar — file explorer, changes, git graph, comments, and worktree list. Toggle each with E, C, G, and R.
• Center — editors, diff views, terminals, and agent panels. This is your main workspace.
• Right sidebar — additional panels docked to the right (optional; drag any panel here).
• Bottom — secondary panels, often terminals or output views.
• Status bar — active branch, upstream tracking (↑ X ↓ Y), and context info.

Panels are fully rearrangeable by drag and drop. Use 1–9 to focus a specific panel, Tab / Tab to cycle through open panels. See Panel Layout for details on persistence and keyboard navigation.

Open a file, make a change, and commit

Open a file

Press P to open Quick Open. Type any part of a file path — results filter with fuzzy matching. Press Enter to open the file.

To jump to a specific line, append :line to the filename: for example, type app.ts:42 to land on line 42.

Make a change

Loxel autosaves 250ms after you stop typing, with a maximum 5s delay. Press S to save immediately. Format-on-save runs on explicit save by default.

Stage your changes

• File-level: in the Changes panel (C), right-click any file and choose Stage.
• Hunk-level: open the file’s diff in unified view. Each hunk has a Stage hunk button — use this to stage only part of a file’s changes.

Commit

In the Changes panel, type a commit message in the input at the top and press Enter or click Commit. Loxel commits all staged changes to the current worktree’s branch.

Create a worktree for a new task

When you’re ready to start a parallel task without touching your current working state, create a new worktree.

• Click the + button in the worktrees sidebar.
• Press N from anywhere in the app.

Loxel prompts you for a branch name. After creation, the new worktree appears in the sidebar and becomes the active context — with a clean working tree, its own editor layout, and its own agent sessions.

Switch back to your previous worktree by clicking it in the sidebar, or use ← / → to cycle. Your layout and open files are restored exactly as you left them.

See Worktrees & Projects for branch planning, dirty-status tracking, and the wt integration.