about
Who makes GitDesktop, and why.
GitDesktop is built by one person, in the open.
Why it exists
GitDesktop began with a question that kept coming back: why does everything past the commit mean leaving the Git client? Creating a pull request, reviewing changes, managing branches, using AI. Each one meant leaving. The answer became a five-word design constraint. The whole loop, one window.
Who makes it
I'm theBGuy. I make developer tools. For the past few years I've been a founding or lead engineer at early-stage startups, and along the way I've contributed to Biome, the toolchain this codebase lints with.
GitDesktop (Rust, Tauri, React) is my biggest solo project, and I build it with itself: every change I write is reviewed in the app before it merges.
Find me on GitHub, or email thebguy.github@gmail.com.
How it's built
- Local-first
- Your code never reaches us, and the app works without any account.
- Open source
- Apache-2.0, developed in public on GitHub.
- Keyboard-first
- Built to be driven without the mouse: a command palette and rebindable shortcuts.
- No vendor account
- Sign in only to the forges you use: GitHub via gh, GitLab via glab, Bitbucket with an API token.
- Optional AI
- Your own models or keyless CLIs, keys in your OS keychain, and one switch hides every AI surface.
- Careful with your work
- Signed releases and auto-updates; discards are recoverable and pushes use --force-with-lease with --force-if-includes where your Git can check it.
The record
The project's paper trail is public:
- Changelog — every release's changes, the same notes the app shows when it updates.
- GitHub Releases — the builds and their signatures.
- Privacy — what the site and app collect, and what they never touch.
- Terms — Apache-2.0 software, provided as-is.
The rest is in the app.
Free, open source, and local — built by the person who answers the issues.