I think that so far all of my vibe-coded tools have been things I need or I want, which is probably why I am their sole user! But ignoring that, there is utility in them. And there is utility in building them. (See also: Life Calendar, Generative Art, Big Beautiful Screens.) My latest project is cd-info a simple cd wrapper. When you cd into a directory it looks for a .cdinfo file in the directoty and if it finds one it displays it’s content.

The Need

I’m vibe-coding many projects at once now adays. I have multiple clients work in progress at any given moment. And I have ALL of the technologies in the mix. Thankfully, that’s an exaggeration, there’s no cobal. But there is Node, Python, SQL, Docker, Godot, Claude, Codex, and more…

When I cd into a directory, sometimes I just stare at the terminal, or I might start with an ls. It takes time for me to get my bearings.

That is the problem cd-info solves: context switching on the command line.

The solutions

A .cdinfo file is pretty simple, here’s what it looks like:

# ============================================================
# This file is used by cd-info to display directory information
# Learn more: https://github.com/wrathagom/cd-info
# ============================================================
# --- END CD-INFO HEADER ---

# Generative Art Repo

To launch run `docker compose up` or `dcul` if you are using [docker-alias](/blog/docker-my-trusty-multi-tool).

Then visit http://localhost:8080

The first bit is really just meta data so people understand what the file is. Everything after # ---- END CD-INFO HEADER --- gets displayed when you cd into a directory. No other commands required.

Use it

I’ve tried to make installation as simple as possible:

  1. Clone the repo git clone https://github.com/wrathagom/cd-info.git
  2. The install ./install.sh

Installing exports the shell script into your .bashrc or .zshrc files. It also installs a SKILLS.md file to make it easy to ask your agents:

Create a .cdinfo file for this project

Built for… me

Like I said, I needed it, so I built it. But I hope it helps someone else as well. it’s simple, compact, straightforward. But it helps me move faster and stay fast.

If you want, give it a try. It’s on Github for the whole world to try, but I doubt they have the need: https://github.com/wrathagom/cd-info