Why Arbor?
The Vector RAG Problem: Most AI coding assistants treat your codebase like a bag of text. They embed chunks into vectors and hope similarity search finds the right context. The result? Hallucinated connections, missing dependencies, and refactors that break everything downstream.
Arbor thinks differently.
We parse your code into an Abstract Syntax Tree using Tree-sitter, then build a living graph where every function, class, and variable is a node, and every import, call, and implementation is an edge. When an AI asks "where is authentication handled?", Arbor doesn't grep for "auth" — it traces the call graph to find the actual service that initiates the flow.
Quick Start
Option 1: Download Pre-built Binary (Recommended)
Download arbor-windows-v0.1.0.zip from the Releases page.
Option 2: Build from Source
That's it. Your IDE or AI agent can now connect to ws://localhost:7433 and query the graph.
Features
AST-Graph Intelligence
Every code entity becomes a queryable node. Arbor understands scope, shadowing, and namespace isolation — so when you ask for context, you get the exact logical block, not keyword-matched noise.
Sub-100ms Incremental Sync
Arbor watches your files and re-parses only the changed AST nodes. In a 100k-line monorepo, saving a file triggers a ~15ms update. You'll never notice it running.
Blast Radius Analysis
Refactoring a function? Arbor traces every caller, every consumer, every downstream dependency. See the full impact before you break production.
Semantic Ranking
Not all code is equal. Arbor ranks nodes by "centrality" — a function called by 50 others is more architecturally significant than a one-off utility. Context windows get the important stuff first.
Logic Forest Visualizer
The optional desktop app renders your codebase as an interactive force-directed graph. Custom shaders create bloom and glow effects as you navigate. Features include:
Follow Mode: Camera automatically tracks the node the AI is focusing on
Low GPU Mode: Disable effects for better performance on older hardware
Real-time Sync: Graph updates as you edit code
Health Check
Verify your environment with a single command:
Architecture
The Protocol
The Arbor Protocol is a simple JSON-RPC interface over WebSocket. Here's what your AI agent can ask:
See docs/PROTOCOL.md for the full specification.
Supported Languages
Language | Status | Parser |
TypeScript | ✅ | tree-sitter-typescript |
JavaScript | ✅ | tree-sitter-typescript |
Rust | ✅ | tree-sitter-rust |
Python | ✅ | tree-sitter-python |
Go | 🚧 | Coming soon |
Java | 🚧 | Coming soon |
Adding a new language? See our language contribution guide.
Project Structure
Performance
We obsess over speed because slow tools don't get used.
Metric | Target | Actual |
Initial index (10k files) | < 5s | ~2.3s |
Incremental update | < 100ms | ~15ms |
Query response | < 50ms | ~8ms |
Memory (100k LOC) | < 200MB | ~120MB |
Benchmarks run on M1 MacBook Pro. Your mileage may vary, but not by much.
Contributing
We love contributors. Whether you're fixing a typo, adding a language parser, or building something entirely new — you're welcome here.
Read CONTRIBUTING.md
Check the good first issues
Join the discussion in GitHub Discussions
Roadmap
Phase 1: Core indexer and CLI
Phase 2: Logic Forest visualizer ✅
Phase 3: VS Code extension ✅
Phase 4: Agentic Bridge (MCP) ✅
Phase 5: Linux ARM64/AMD64 + macOS ARM64 CI/CD ✅
Phase 6: Language server protocol support
Phase 7: Go and Java parser support
Security
Arbor is designed with security in mind:
No data exfiltration: All indexing happens locally; no code leaves your machine
No API keys required: Works entirely offline
No telemetry: Zero phone-home behavior
Open source: Full source code available for audit
The Unified Nervous System
Arbor v0.1.0 is feature-complete. The entire stack is now synchronized:
Experience: Ask Claude, "How does auth work?" → Watch your IDE highlight the file → Watch the Visualizer fly to the node.
CLI Commands
Command | Description |
| Creates |
| Full index of the codebase |
| Search the graph |
| Start the sidecar server |
| Export graph to JSON |
| Show index status |
| Launch the Logic Forest visualizer |
| Start MCP server for AI integration |
| MCP + Visualizer together |
| System diagnostics and health check |
License
MIT — use it however you want. See LICENSE for details.