Worktree Explorer

A VS Code extension that adds a secondary Explorer view bound to one selected Git linked worktree — browse, open, create, rename, and delete files in it — without adding that worktree to your workspace.

Git worktrees let you check out several branches of one repository at once. VS Code can already discover them in Source Control, but the built-in File Explorer stays tied to your workspace folders. Worktree Explorer gives you a native, familiar file tree for another worktree — the one selected in Source Control, or one you pick manually — while your current workspace, tasks, search, and language tooling stay exactly as they are.

How it works

• Follows Source Control automatically. Select a linked worktree's repository in the Source Control view and Worktree Explorer appears, rooted at it. Select the main repository (or nothing linked) and it hides again.
• Manual override. Use the Select Worktree action (view title, or Command Palette) to open any discovered linked worktree directly. A manual choice stays active until Source Control selection changes.
• Browse, open, create, rename, delete. Standard Explorer-like interactions, scoped strictly to the active worktree.
• Never touches your workspace. The active worktree is never added to workspace.workspaceFolders or any .code-workspace file — this is a browsing/editing surface, not a second workspace, and multi-root side effects (search, tasks, extension activation) never apply to it.

Scope and limitations

This is intentionally smaller than a second full VS Code workspace:

• Local filesystem repositories and linked worktrees only.
• Requires VS Code's built-in Git extension (bundled with VS Code by default).
• Does not create, move, prune, lock, or delete Git worktrees themselves — only files/folders inside the active one.
• No staging, committing, merging, rebasing, or branch management.
• No drag-and-drop, copy/cut/paste, or multi-selection operations.
• No Git status decorations, no webview, no telemetry — nothing ever leaves your machine.

See docs/PRD.md §5 for the complete list of non-goals and §32 for ideas deliberately kept out of this first release.

Safety

Every file operation is validated by a single shared boundary guard before it touches disk:

• Mutations can never escape the active worktree root (path traversal and symlink-escape targets are rejected).
• The worktree root itself and Git administrative paths (.git) can never be renamed or deleted.
• Commands re-validate the active worktree immediately before mutating, so a worktree switch that happens mid-operation aborts it instead of writing to the wrong place.
• Mutating commands are disabled by default in untrusted workspaces (browsing and opening remain available).

Commands

Settings

All settings live under worktreeExplorer.* — see the Extension Settings action above, or search worktreeExplorer in VS Code Settings. They cover following/restoring selection, sort order, hidden files, exclusions, delete confirmation, and trash behavior.

Development

npm install
npm run compile   # type-check, lint, bundle
npm test          # unit and integration suites
npm run profile   # performance profile against a large synthetic tree (not part of npm test)

Press F5 in VS Code to launch the Extension Development Host.

See docs/PRD.md for the full product requirements and docs/IMPLEMENTATION_ISSUES.md / docs/issues/ for the implementation backlog this was built against.

Privacy

No telemetry, no analytics, no network calls of any kind — this extension has zero runtime dependencies and only ever reads/writes the local filesystem through VS Code's own APIs.