{"slug": "show-hn-codebase-guide-get-the-onboarding-doc-nobody-ever-had-time-to-write", "title": "Show HN: Codebase-guide: get the onboarding doc nobody ever had time to write", "summary": "Developer dimitritholen released Codebase-guide, a Claude plugin that reads a repository and writes a single offline HTML onboarding document to docs/codebase-guide.html, leaving all other files unedited. The plugin is installed via `claude plugin marketplace add dimitritholen/codebase-guide` and `claude plugin install codebase-guide@codebase-guide`, then invoked with the `/codebase-guide` command, and its example guide was generated for the Tauri and React desktop app \"Let me cook!\" at almost 140,000 lines of Rust and TypeScript. Each guide contains the same eight sections — a one-minute overview, key words, main parts, one traced request, patterns, a where-to-find-things table, run instructions, and collapsible notes — with code excerpts copied at real line numbers and the source commit recorded.", "body_md": "**Point Claude at a repo and get back the onboarding doc nobody ever had time\nto write.**\n\nOne command reads your codebase and writes a single HTML file that explains it: what the project does, which parts it is made of, how one real request moves through the code, and which file to open for any change you want to make. The diagrams are drawn from the actual code, every path and function name in it exists, and the file opens offline in any browser.\n\n<sub>Every screenshot on this page comes from one guide, written for Let me\ncook!, a Tauri and React desktop app with almost 140,000 lines of Rust and\nTypeScript.</sub>\n\n- **Newcomers get it on the first read.** The guide opens with the project in\na few plain sentences, defines the jargon, and shows the whole system in\none diagram.\n- **Old hands find any file in minutes.** A \"where to find things\" table maps\nevery feature and common task to the file and function to open first.\n- **It only says what the code says.** Code excerpts are copied with their\nreal line numbers, the guide records the commit it was written from, and\nanything unclear or apparently unused is flagged instead of guessed.\n- **One file, nothing to host.** Fonts, styles and diagrams are embedded.\nCommit it to`docs/` , send it to a new hire, or print it to PDF.\n\nEvery guide has the same eight sections: a one-minute overview, key words, the main parts, one real run traced step by step, patterns to know, where to find things, how to run it yourself, and collapsible notes for going deeper.\n\nEach box is a real part of the codebase, labelled with the folder it lives in. Solid arrows are calls, dashed ones are events.\n\nA folder map ties every component to its directory, with numbers that match the part cards further down.\n\nA sequence diagram follows a single request through the actual functions. The numbered steps under it name the file and function for each arrow.\n\nRecurring conventions get a real excerpt, the line range it came from, and the reason it is done that way.\n\nStart from the task you have, and the table tells you where to look and which function to start with.\n\n```\nclaude plugin marketplace add dimitritholen/codebase-guide\nclaude plugin install codebase-guide@codebase-guide\n/codebase-guide\n```\n\nThe short form `/codebase-guide` works too, as long as no other installed\nplugin has a skill with the same name.\n\nOr ask for a codebase guide, an onboarding doc, an architecture overview, or\n\"explain this repo\". The guide is written to `docs/codebase-guide.html`\nunless you name another path, and no other file is edited.\n\n- `design_system` (meridian/builtin, default meridian): the look of the\nguide.`meridian` is an editorial design system with embedded fonts;`builtin` uses the skill's own template. Change it in`/config` , or for one\nshell with`CODEBASE_GUIDE_DESIGN_SYSTEM` .\n\nSee [design-systems/README.md](https://github.com/dimitritholen/codebase-guide/blob/main/design-systems/README.md) for the contract a\nnew design system has to meet.\n\n- `python3` to resolve the design-system setting.\n- `node` to export a design-system draft into one offline HTML file (not\nneeded for`builtin` ).\n\nNo keys or network needed:\n\n```\nfor t in tests/*.test.sh; do bash \"$t\"; done\n```\n\nThe bundled Newsreader and Public Sans fonts are under the SIL Open Font\nLicense; the notices sit next to the font files in\n`design-systems/meridian/assets/fonts/` and are embedded in every exported\nguide.", "url": "https://wpnews.pro/news/show-hn-codebase-guide-get-the-onboarding-doc-nobody-ever-had-time-to-write", "canonical_source": "https://github.com/dimitritholen/codebase-guide", "published_at": "2026-10-06 13:26:26+00:00", "updated_at": "2026-10-06 13:51:29.410342+00:00", "lang": "en", "topics": ["ai-tools", "developer-tools", "ai-products"], "entities": ["Codebase-guide", "Claude", "dimitritholen", "Let me cook!", "Tauri", "React", "Rust", "TypeScript"], "also_reported_by": [], "alternates": {"html": "https://wpnews.pro/news/show-hn-codebase-guide-get-the-onboarding-doc-nobody-ever-had-time-to-write", "markdown": "https://wpnews.pro/news/show-hn-codebase-guide-get-the-onboarding-doc-nobody-ever-had-time-to-write.md", "text": "https://wpnews.pro/news/show-hn-codebase-guide-get-the-onboarding-doc-nobody-ever-had-time-to-write.txt", "jsonld": "https://wpnews.pro/news/show-hn-codebase-guide-get-the-onboarding-doc-nobody-ever-had-time-to-write.jsonld"}}