# radovskyb/watcher

watcher is a Go package for watching for files or directory changes without using filesystem events.

Repository: https://github.com/radovskyb/watcher
Canonical: https://ross.abutalabs.com/products/watcher
Language: Go
License: BSD-3-Clause
License Family: permissive
Topics: go, filesystem-events, polling, notifier, cross-platform, golang, recursive, watcher
Last push: 2023-10-12T22:53:15+00:00

## Health v2 (maintenance only)
Score: 23/100 (v2, computed 2026-09-03T02:20:16.233290+00:00)
- activity 0, release rhythm 8, longevity 100
- inputs: {"age_days": 3627, "days_push": 1056, "days_rel": null, "gap_med": null, "n_releases_24m": 0}
- flags: none
- formula: round(0.45*activity + 0.35*rhythm + 0.20*longevity); archived -> min(score, 10)

## Adoption (not part of the score)
Stars 1505, forks 185 (observed 2026-08-28T04:04:54.877183+00:00)

## What it is
watcher is a Go package for watching files and directories for changes using polling instead of filesystem events, ensuring consistent cross-platform behavior. It notifies over channels with os.FileInfo details and supports recursive watching, filtering, and custom events.

## Use cases
- watch files and directories for changes in go
- cross-platform file change detection without fsnotify
- poll directories recursively for modifications
- trigger actions when files are renamed or moved
- filter watched files by regex pattern

## When to choose
- you need consistent file watching behavior across all platforms
- filesystem event APIs are unreliable or unavailable in your environment
- you need fine-grained control over polling interval and event filtering

## When to avoid
- you need high-performance, low-latency file watching on a supported platform
- you prefer OS-native inotify/FSEvents-based watchers like fsnotify

## Facets
- artifact type: library
- maturity: maintenance
- function: file-system, developer-tools
- domain: developer-tools, files, cross-platform
- platform: go, cross-platform, cli
- tags: file-watching, polling, filesystem-monitoring, go-library

## Member repositories
- radovskyb/watcher (main) score 23

## Provenance
- Observed fields: from GitHub, fetched 2026-08-28T04:04:54.877183+00:00.
- Health v2: computed from the inputs above; adoption is never an input.
- Inferred fields (summary, facets, guidance): AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, on 2026-08-30T04:32:43.227516+00:00, confidence not recorded.
  - readme: https://github.com/radovskyb/watcher (fetched 2026-08-28T04:04:54.877183+00:00, sha 3f8bddf6110b)
- Data as of 2026-08-30T08:39:29.467469+00:00.