{"slug": "watchexec", "name": "watchexec", "category": "terminal", "category_name": "Terminal and shell", "description": "", "recommenders": 3, "commenters": 4, "warners": 0, "score": 2.847, "rising": -0.98, "first": "2026-02-03", "latest": "2026-04-02", "why": "I personally like and use watchexec [1] to run commands on repeat.", "why_is_quote": true, "has_verdict": false, "sentiment": {"recommend": 3, "neutral": 1, "compare": 0, "warn": 0}, "spark": [0, 0, 0, 1, 1, 1, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0], "listed": true, "loved": [], "caveat": "", "short_quote": "I personally like and use watchexec [1] to run commands on repeat.", "kind": "", "icon": true, "domain": null, "github_repo": "github.com/watchexec/watchexec", "official_url": "https://watchexec.github.io", "pricing": "", "aliases": ["watchexec"], "verdict": null, "praise": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 761808305, "item_id": 47613019, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47613019", "by": "digikata", "date": "2026-04-02", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "rerun on file change, knows about .gitignore/.ignore etc (in rust)", "excerpt": "You might be interested in: https://github.com/cantino/mcfly - fuzzy shell history (feels lighter than atuin to me, in rust) https://github.com/watchexec/watchexec - rerun on file change, knows about .gitignore/.ignore etc (in rust) https://github.com/jonas/tig - instead of lazygit, mostly for easier git log viewing for me as I use straight git most of the time Otherwise a lot of crossover in what I use too.", "context": "", "use_case": "rerun on file change", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What dev tools do you rely on that nobody talks about?"}, {"id": 760972480, "item_id": 47560780, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47560780", "by": "jvican", "date": "2026-03-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I personally like and use watchexec [1] to run commands on repeat.", "excerpt": "I personally like and use watchexec [1] to run commands on repeat. Syntax example: `watchexec -r -e py uv run pytest -xvvs file.py` [1]: https://github.com/watchexec/watchexec", "context": "", "use_case": "Run commands on file change", "switched_from": "", "story": "Detecting file changes on macOS with kqueue"}, {"id": 750026161, "item_id": 46876635, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46876635", "by": "jiehong", "date": "2026-02-03", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Yep, I think a watcher is better suited [0] to trigger on file changes.", "excerpt": "Yep, I think a watcher is better suited [0] to trigger on file changes. I personally can't stand my git commit command to be slow or to fail. [0]: such as https://github.com/watchexec/watchexec", "context": "", "use_case": "Triggering checks on file change", "switched_from": "", "story": "Prek: A better, faster, drop-in pre-commit replacement, engineered in Rust"}]}], "caveats": [], "who": [], "tags": [], "use_cases": ["rerun on file change", "run commands on file change", "file-change triggers", "triggering checks on file change"], "compared": [], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47602040", "title": "Ask HN: What dev tools do you rely on that nobody talks about?", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47508710", "title": "Detecting file changes on macOS with kqueue", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47245373", "title": "Multi-agent Claude Code setup \u2013 3 roles, Markdown coordination, Docker", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46873138", "title": "Prek: A better, faster, drop-in pre-commit replacement, engineered in Rust", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {}, "2025-12": {}, "2026-01": {}, "2026-02": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-03": {"neutral": 1, "recommend": 1}, "2026-04": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-05": {}, "2026-06": {}, "2026-07": {}, "2026-08": {}, "2026-09": {}, "2026-10": {}}, "quotes": [{"id": 761808305, "item_id": 47613019, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47613019", "by": "digikata", "date": "2026-04-02", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "rerun on file change, knows about .gitignore/.ignore etc (in rust)", "excerpt": "You might be interested in: https://github.com/cantino/mcfly - fuzzy shell history (feels lighter than atuin to me, in rust) https://github.com/watchexec/watchexec - rerun on file change, knows about .gitignore/.ignore etc (in rust) https://github.com/jonas/tig - instead of lazygit, mostly for easier git log viewing for me as I use straight git most of the time Otherwise a lot of crossover in what I use too.", "context": "", "use_case": "rerun on file change", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What dev tools do you rely on that nobody talks about?"}, {"id": 760972480, "item_id": 47560780, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47560780", "by": "jvican", "date": "2026-03-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I personally like and use watchexec [1] to run commands on repeat.", "excerpt": "I personally like and use watchexec [1] to run commands on repeat. Syntax example: `watchexec -r -e py uv run pytest -xvvs file.py` [1]: https://github.com/watchexec/watchexec", "context": "", "use_case": "Run commands on file change", "switched_from": "", "story": "Detecting file changes on macOS with kqueue"}, {"id": 755926225, "item_id": 47245389, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47245389", "by": "yego", "date": "2026-03-04", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "full auto-orchestration with watchexec", "excerpt": "HOW AGENTS COORDINATE Agents don't talk to each other directly. They coordinate through a shared docs repo: docs/ \u251c\u2500\u2500 tasks/ \u2014 task files per role (backend.md, frontend.md, ceo.md) \u251c\u2500\u2500 messages/ \u2014 inter-agent correspondence (dated markdown files) \u251c\u2500\u2500 decisions.md \u2014 architecture decision log \u251c\u2500\u2500 guidelines/ \u2014 coding conventions (Go, SQL, workflow) \u251c\u2500\u2500 reference/ \u2014 API spec, data model \u2514\u2500\u2500 tracking/ \u2014 workplan, sprint ", "context": "", "use_case": "File-change triggers", "switched_from": "", "story": "Multi-agent Claude Code setup \u2013 3 roles, Markdown coordination, Docker"}, {"id": 750026161, "item_id": 46876635, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46876635", "by": "jiehong", "date": "2026-02-03", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Yep, I think a watcher is better suited [0] to trigger on file changes.", "excerpt": "Yep, I think a watcher is better suited [0] to trigger on file changes. I personally can't stand my git commit command to be slow or to fail. [0]: such as https://github.com/watchexec/watchexec", "context": "", "use_case": "Triggering checks on file change", "switched_from": "", "story": "Prek: A better, faster, drop-in pre-commit replacement, engineered in Rust"}]}