// the find
google/git-appraise
Distributed code review system for Git repos
git-appraise stores code review data as git-notes directly in your repository, so reviews travel with the code during push/pull. No server, no external service — works with any git host. Aimed at teams who want review history to be as portable as their commits.
The cat_sort_uniq merge strategy for git-notes is a genuinely clever solution to the conflict problem — appending JSON lines means concurrent review activity merges cleanly without manual intervention. Zero server setup is a real differentiator; you can do code review on a bare git repo over SSH with no web UI or database. CI status and static analysis results stored in the same refs as review comments means your build feedback lives alongside human feedback in one queryable place. The schema is versioned (the 'v' field) which shows some foresight about evolving the format without breaking existing notes.
Last meaningful commit was 2023, and the Travis CI badge in the README points to a service that's largely dead for open source — the project feels unmaintained. The CLI-only workflow is a hard sell in 2024 when engineers expect a web UI with inline diff comments; the companion git-appraise-web project is a separate repo that also appears stale. git-notes have a notoriously awkward UX — they don't show up in standard git log output and most hosting platforms ignore them entirely, so GitHub/GitLab users get zero value from the distributed model. With 144 forks and no active maintainer, adopting this means owning it yourself.