AI Changes Timeline

Know exactly which files your AI assistant changed — and which prompt changed them.

A Visual Studio Code extension that records every AI editing session as a timeline entry, so you can see what Claude Code (or Copilot, Codex, Gemini CLI, Cursor…) touched, review the diff, and restore a single file or an entire prompt's worth of changes.

v0.1.0 — the full MVP works, including restore. Not yet on the Marketplace; install the .vsix (below). See CHANGELOG.md for detail.

The problem

AI coding assistants edit many files per conversation. After a few prompts, git status shows one flat pile:

Modified:
  auth.py
  user.py
  models.py
  config.py
  tests.py
  README.md

Git cannot answer the question you actually have:

Which of these came from my last prompt?

Copilot shows a temporary "Edited Files" list, but it disappears and keeps no history.

The solution

Every AI interaction becomes one entry in an AI Changes timeline:

▼ Today
  ▼ 4:35 PM · Claude · 3 files · +142 −23
      "Implement JWT authentication"
        auth.py
        middleware.py
        routes.py
  ▼ 4:42 PM · Claude · 2 files · +18 −6
      "Fix failing tests"
        tests.py
        package.json
  ▼ 4:50 PM · Claude · 1 file · +9 −0
      "Improve README"
        README.md

Click a session to see its stats. Click a file to diff it against its pre-AI snapshot. Right-click to restore.

Features

All of the above works today. See MVP scope for what was in scope and ROADMAP.md for what comes next.

Installation

From the Marketplace (once published):

1. Open the Extensions view (Cmd/Ctrl+Shift+X).
2. Search for AI Changes Timeline.
3. Click Install.

From a .vsix — the current path, since it is not published yet:

npm install
npm run package
code --install-extension ai-changes-timeline-0.1.0.vsix

From source — see CONTRIBUTING.md.

Usage

1. Open the AI Changes icon in the Activity Bar.
2. Use your AI assistant as normal. Bursts of file edits are grouped into sessions automatically.
3. Expand a session to see its files.
4. Click a file → diff against the pre-change snapshot.
5. Right-click a file or session → Restore, Compare, Reveal, Copy Path.

If automatic detection misses a session, start and stop one manually with AI Changes: Start Session / AI Changes: End Session.

Commands

All commands are available from the Command Palette (Cmd/Ctrl+Shift+P):

Available from a session's right-click menu: Set Prompt / Label, Pin / Unpin, Merge with Previous Session, Restore All Files in Session, Delete Session.

From a file's right-click menu: Compare with Before AI Change, Restore File, Reveal in Explorer View, Copy Path.

Settings

For extension authors

activate() returns a small read-only API, so another extension can observe sessions:

const api = vscode.extensions.getExtension('rajendrac3.ai-changes-timeline')?.exports;
const sessions = await api?.getSessions();

{ version, getSessions, getActiveSession, settled, getSnapshot, restoreSession }. Read-only by design — no third party gets to rewrite your history.

Privacy

• All history stays on your machine. Nothing is sent anywhere.
• No telemetry.
• Prompt text can be disabled entirely with aiChanges.storePrompts: false.
• Snapshots live in the workspace storage directory and honour aiChanges.exclude.

Documentation

• Product Requirements (PRD) — problem, users, features, MVP scope.
• Architecture — components, data model, session detection, storage.
• Roadmap — what's planned and when.
• Contributing — dev setup, conventions, PR process, and the release runbook.

Contributing

Issues and pull requests are welcome. Please read CONTRIBUTING.md first.

License

MIT © Rajendra Choudhary