Desktop app

The desktop app is CodArch in a native window (Electron). It analyses with the same engine as the CLI, so the snapshot has the same checksum, but it does so against the real disk and with git: the snapshot carries churn and there are no browser limits.

Install

Download your system’s installer from the repository Releases:

System	File	What it does
Windows	codarch-<version>-setup.exe (NSIS)	per-user install in %LOCALAPPDATA%\Programs\CodArch, no administrator needed
Linux	codarch-<version>-amd64.deb	installs the app system-wide, with its menu entry
Linux	codarch-<version>-x86_64.AppImage	runs without installing anything (chmod +x and open)

macOS is not published: without signing or notarisation, Gatekeeper blocks the app. The installers are unsigned; see the FAQ.

The window

The window shows the same interface as the web app: the VISTA panel, the map and the inspector. The interface is in Spanish; this page uses the names as they appear on screen.

The theme is picked in Ajustes › General, the same as in the web app: light or dark paper belongs to the machine and the map’s tiles keep their colour.

Archivo, Edición, Ver and Ayuda menus

On top of the interface, the app has native menus: Archivo (file), Edición (edit), Ver (view) and Ayuda (help).

Elige la carpeta del repositorio

There are three ways to open a repo, from most to least common:

• ABRIR REPOSITORIO O ARCHIVO: the header button opens a drop-down with Analizar carpeta… (analyse folder), Archivo cc.json… (cc.json file) and Reporte JSON… (JSON report). It is the main way and works the same as in the web app. Analizar carpeta… opens the native Elige la carpeta del repositorio (choose the repository folder) dialog. The Archivo menu has the same actions.
• Shortcuts: Ctrl+O analyses a folder, Ctrl+Shift+O opens a JSON.
• A path on start: the app accepts a folder, a cc.json or a report.json as an argument and opens it right after starting. The installers do not register file associations, so the app does not show up in «Open with» on its own: pick it by hand in that file-explorer menu or pass it the path from a terminal (/opt/CodArch/codarch /path/to/repo with the .deb, ./codarch-<version>-x86_64.AppImage /path/to/repo with the AppImage).

The .codarch/ folder

The repo state is saved in its .codarch/ folder, not in the app. What CodArch writes there:

File	What it is
snapshot.cc.json	the latest snapshot
rest.cc.json	the map of what is not code (documents, configuration and assets)
head-report.json	what was touched since the last commit
report.json	a diff report, only if one was loaded
chains.json	the symbol chain ledger
preferences.json	the view preferences
parse-cache.json	the parse cache of the last pass
lint.repmod.json	the measured lint, with the tree it measured
lint-cache.json	lint rules already resolved, so they are not loaded again
scopes.json	the .codarch/ folders seen below this root
shots/	the map captures, in their two slots

That is everything CodArch writes there, and nothing else: the folder belongs to the product, not to your own work. Anything else that shows up —a static map, a hand-made capture, a script— is a leftover, and every analysis deletes it and names it in the console. Local state (preferences, caches, chains, scopes and captures) is left alone even when that pass did not write it. History snapshots do not go here but in .codarch-history/, at the repo root. Neither does a static map: codarch render copies the whole web app to the folder you give it, with the snapshot in data/snapshot.cc.json.

Ajustes › General

The first section of Ajustes picks the theme: Claro, Oscuro or El sistema (see Ajustes › General in the web app). In the desktop app the preference lives in the app, not in the repository.

Ajustes › Actualizaciones

Updates only show up in Ajustes › Actualizaciones (settings › updates): it shows the installed version and whether it is up to date. There is no banner; when a new version exists, the notice appears in that section. The AppImage updates without permissions; the .deb asks for the administrator password, like any package. See Updates.