jjacks

jjacks is a Jujutsu-backed GitHub stacking tool following a strict mental model of one "bookmark" per Pull Request.

Who's this for?

Why do we need another stacking tool? There's already Graphite and a dozen other GitHub stacking tools. While learning Jujutsu, the amend-only workflow felt underused when working with GitHub. In jjacks, if you're on a bookmark you'll see the diff at all times.

Install

jjacks is packaged as a Node CLI. Install it globally:

npm install --global jjacks

For local development from a checkout:

npm install
npm run build
npm link

Shell Completions

jjacks can generate shell completion scripts:

source <(jjacks --completions zsh)
source <(jjacks --completions bash)
jjacks --completions fish | source

Requirements:

• Node.js 22 or newer
• git
• jj
• GitHub CLI gh
• gh auth login completed for the target GitHub host

Setup

Use a Git repo that has been initialized for jj:

jj git init --colocate

jjacks requires bookmark movement to be enabled:

jj config set --user advance-bookmarks.enabled true

Stack breadcrumbs are written as PR comments by default. To write them into PR descriptions instead:

jj config set --repo jjacks.stack_comments.location description

New pull requests are created with an empty description by default. To use the repo's default pull request template when jjacks sync creates PRs:

jj config set --repo jjacks.pull_requests.use_template true

Commands

• jjacks doctor
• jjacks status
• jjacks create <bookmark-name>
• jjacks get <branch-name>
• jjacks up
• jjacks u
• jjacks down
• jjacks d
• jjacks log
• jjacks diff
• jjacks sync
• jjacks sync --dry-run
• jjacks sync --execute
• jjacks merge

Getting Remote Branches

Use get when someone else pushed a branch and you want to adopt it into your local jj workspace:

jjacks get feat/coworker-branch

jjacks get <branch-name> prints a plan and asks before fetching or editing local state. If a local bookmark with the same name already exists and points somewhere else, the prompt clearly says it will overwrite that bookmark and defaults to No.

Use get on the default branch when you want a fresh trunk continuation without syncing or pushing your current stack:

jjacks get main

This fetches origin, moves the local default branch bookmark to its remote, and continues from that default branch using the same clean working-copy behavior as jjacks down.

To preview without changing local state:

jjacks get feat/coworker-branch --dry-run

Sync Modes

jjacks sync builds a plan, prints it, and asks before applying changes.

jjacks sync --dry-run prints the plan without changing local state or GitHub.

jjacks sync --execute applies the plan without prompting. It may fetch, move the local default bookmark, push stack bookmarks, create or edit pull requests, and update stack breadcrumbs.

Local Telemetry

jjacks can record local command timing telemetry to .jjacks/telemetry/commands.jsonl inside the repo. Telemetry is disabled by default. To enable it for a repo:

jj config set --repo jjacks.telemetry.enabled true

The telemetry directory is gitignored and is intended for local performance analysis.

Generate a static HTML report from the collected data:

npm run telemetry:report

The report is written to .jjacks/telemetry/report.html. It is a static file with no build step; the browser loads Chart.js from esm.sh when you open it.

Docs

• Tutorial
• Open questions

Notes

• The supported workflow is one jj bookmark per GitHub pull request.
• sync --execute is intentionally direct: if a network or GitHub step fails, rerun jjacks status and jjacks sync after fixing the underlying issue.
• Broader multi-stack management and unusual jj topologies are still beta territory.