CodexTree

Codex Tree is a branch-aware environment for AI-assisted software development. It turns a normally linear Codex chat into a tree of connected conversations so users can split a complex task into separate branches, keep the right context in each branch, and still merge the results back together later. The project includes a VS Code custom editor that visualizes the workflow as a tree and a Python backend that manages the actual branch sessions against a target codebase. The core idea is that software work is rarely linear. A user might ask Codex to plan an app, then break that work into branches such as API, UI, tests, or bug fixes. Each branch inherits the relevant prior context, maintains its own chat history, and runs in its own git-backed worktree so filesystem changes stay isolated. This avoids the common workflow of creating a new feature branch, starting a brand new AI session, and then re-prompting the model with all of the same background context just to continue related work. When work is complete, Codex can merge branches back into a new combined branch using both the branch workspaces and the saved conversation histories as context. Key features include visual tree-based chat editing in VS Code, branch creation from the current tip, the root, earlier turns, or specific nodes, per-branch filesystem snapshots and rollback, persisted session state, Codex-driven branch merges, streaming runtime events for assistant output, commands, tools, and file changes, command and file-change approval handling, and the ability to adjust model and reasoning level across turns. Compared with the regular Codex app fork and worktree logic, Codex Tree adds a much more usable layer on top: branches are visible as part of one connected workflow, branch points are tied to conversation nodes rather than being managed as isolated threads, users can branch from historical points with matching filesystem state, and rolling back a branch restores both the chat history and the files together. In the regular Codex app, once a fork is made the relationship to the original chat is much easier to lose because it appears as a separate chat thread. In Codex Tree, that relationship stays visible as a linked branch in the same view, so related ideas, experiments, and follow-up work remain grouped together instead of being scattered across separate chats. The visual tree also makes it much easier to keep track of what branches exist, what conversations happened in each branch, what was done, and roughly when different lines of work diverged or were completed. Because the interface is graphical and user-friendly, it can also make complex coding workflows more accessible to non-technical or less technical users who may find a purely terminal- or chat-driven workflow harder to follow. The graphical display makes plans, ideas, and workflow structure easier to explain, present, and understand. Together, these features make Codex feel less like a single chat window and more like a structured workspace for managing parallel AI development workflows.