stackboi

A terminal UI for managing stacked pull requests on GitHub.

Stacked PRs let you split large features into small, reviewable chunks that build on each other. But after GitHub squash-merges a PR, downstream branches break. stackboi fixes this by automatically rebasing your stack and updating all branch pointers.

Features

• Interactive tree view — See your entire stack at a glance with PR status, sync state, and branch relationships
• Auto-sync on merge — Polls GitHub and prompts you to rebase when a PR gets merged
• Smart rebasing — Uses git rebase --update-refs to update all branches in one operation
• Conflict memory — Leverages git rerere to remember and auto-apply conflict resolutions
• PR creation — Creates PRs with correct base branches and stack visualization in the description

Requirements

• Git 2.38+ (for --update-refs)
• GitHub CLI (gh) authenticated

Installation

Install globally with npm:

npm install -g stackboi

Or with Bun:

bun install -g stackboi

This installs platform-specific native binaries for optimal performance.

Quick Start

# Initialize in your repo
sb init

# Start a new stack from main
git checkout main
sb new feature/auth-base

# Add branches to the stack
sb add feature/auth-login
sb add feature/auth-logout

# Create PRs for each branch
sb pr feature/auth-base
sb pr feature/auth-login
sb pr feature/auth-logout

# Open the interactive view
sb view

Commands

Command	Description
sb init	Initialize stackboi in the current repo
sb new <branch>	Create a new stack with an initial branch
sb add <branch>	Add a branch to the current stack
sb view	Open interactive tree view
sb pr <branch>	Create a GitHub PR for a branch

How It Works

The Problem

You have a stack of branches:

main
 └── feature/auth-base (PR #1)
      └── feature/auth-login (PR #2)
           └── feature/auth-logout (PR #3)

PR #1 gets squash-merged. Now feature/auth-login has a broken history — it's based on commits that no longer exist on main.

The Solution

When stackboi detects a merged PR:

1. Rebases the next branch onto the updated base
2. Uses --update-refs to automatically move all downstream branch pointers
3. Uses git rerere to auto-resolve conflicts you've solved before
4. Updates PR base branches and descriptions on GitHub

Your stack stays clean without manual intervention.

Interactive View

The view command shows a tree of your stacks:

Stacks
├── auth-stack
│   ├── feature/auth-base      PR #12 ✓ merged
│   ├── feature/auth-login     PR #13 ● open     needs-rebase
│   └── feature/auth-logout    PR #14 ○ draft    up-to-date
└── refactor-stack
    ├── refactor/extract-utils PR #15 ● open     up-to-date
    └── refactor/cleanup       PR #16 ● open     up-to-date

Navigate with arrow keys. Press enter to sync when prompted.

Configuration

stackboi stores metadata in .stackboi.json:

{
  "version": 1,
  "stacks": [
    {
      "name": "auth-stack",
      "baseBranch": "main",
      "branches": ["feature/auth-base", "feature/auth-login", "feature/auth-logout"]
    }
  ],
  "settings": {
    "rerere": { "enabled": true, "autoupdate": true },
    "defaultBaseBranch": "main",
    "pollIntervalMs": 30000
  }
}

This file is local to your machine and should be gitignored.

License

GPL-3.0