gitls — like ls, but for git repos.

README.md

gitls — like ls, but for git repos.

Install

Quick install (system-wide):

curl -fsSL https://gist.githubusercontent.com/11c9bc92e22505dfc2513e24791892d1/raw/gitls -o gitls && chmod +x gitls && sudo mv gitls /usr/local/bin/gitls

Or install to your user bin (no sudo required):

mkdir -p ~/bin
curl -fsSL https://gist.githubusercontent.com/11c9bc92e22505dfc2513e24791892d1/raw/gitls -o ~/bin/gitls && chmod +x ~/bin/gitls

Then make sure ~/bin is in your $PATH:

echo 'export PATH="$HOME/bin:$PATH"' >> ~/.bashrc  # or ~/.zshrc
source ~/.bashrc  # or source ~/.zshrc

Usage

gitls             # searches current directory
gitls ~/projects  # searches a specific directory

Example output:

api-service                              on  main
frontend/dashboard                       on  feature/dark-mode
infra/terraform                          on  staging

3 repo(s) found

Features:

• Recursively walks directories using find
• Falls back gracefully — if on a detached HEAD, shows the tag or short SHA instead of crashing
• Accepts an optional path argument
• Color-coded output (repo path in cyan, branch in green)
• Summary count at the end

gitls

#!/usr/bin/env bash
# gitls - recursively find git repos and display their current branch
# Usage: gitls [directory]  (defaults to current directory)

set -euo pipefail

ROOT="${1:-.}"
BOLD="\033[1m"
CYAN="\033[36m"
GREEN="\033[32m"
YELLOW="\033[33m"
RESET="\033[0m"
DIM="\033[2m"

found=0

while IFS= read -r gitdir; do
    repo_dir="$(dirname "$gitdir")"

    branch=$(git -C "$repo_dir" symbolic-ref --short HEAD 2>/dev/null \
        || git -C "$repo_dir" describe --tags --exact-match HEAD 2>/dev/null \
        || git -C "$repo_dir" rev-parse --short HEAD 2>/dev/null \
        || echo "(unknown)")

    rel_path="${repo_dir#$ROOT}"
    rel_path="${rel_path#/}"
    [ -z "$rel_path" ] && rel_path="."

    printf "${BOLD}${CYAN}%-40s${RESET} ${DIM}on${RESET} ${GREEN}%s${RESET}\n" "$rel_path" "$branch"
    (( found++ )) || true

done < <(find "$ROOT" -type d -name ".git" 2>/dev/null | sort)

if (( found == 0 )); then
    printf "${YELLOW}No git repositories found under:${RESET} %s\n" "$ROOT"
else
    printf "\n${DIM}%d repo(s) found${RESET}\n" "$found"
fi

Because now LLM's let me work on a bunch of different things like a squirrel hopped up on caffeine -- with a memory to match!