facebook/watchman
Watches files and records, or triggers actions, when they change. observed · 2026-08-28
Health v2 · maintenance only
95/100
- Activity 99
- Release rhythm 87
- Longevity 100
How is this computed?
round(0.45*activity + 0.35*rhythm + 0.20*longevity); archived -> min(score, 10) — computed 2026-09-03. Adoption (stars, forks) is never an input.
- gap_med: 7.0
- age_days: 5025
- days_rel: 9
- days_push: 7
- n_releases_24m: 101
Adoption not part of the score
13694 stars · 1064 forks observed · 2026-08-28
What it is AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, 2026-08-29, confidence not recorded
Watchman is a file watching service that recursively monitors directory trees and records when files change. It can trigger actions, such as rebuilding assets, when matching files change.
Use cases
- watch a source directory for file changes
- trigger a build or minification when css files change
- query which files changed since the last check
- subscribe to file change events in a directory tree
- speed up incremental builds in large repositories
When to choose
- you need efficient recursive file watching across windows, macos, and linux
- you want to run commands automatically when matching files change
- you need a long-running service with clients in python, rust, or javascript
When to avoid
- you only need simple one-off file polling in a script
- you need to follow symlinked directories, which watchman does not do
- you want a lightweight in-process file watcher rather than a background service
Facets
service · maturity stable
file-system developer-tools cli developer-tools windows cross-platform cli file-watching file-monitoring build-triggers facebook command-line automation linux macos
2 sources
- readme: https://github.com/facebook/watchman · fetched 2026-08-28 · 3254e4120b74
- homepage: https://facebook.github.io/watchman/ · fetched 2026-08-29 · 9a872c15b28b
Member repositories
| Repository | Role | Health v2 |
|---|---|---|
| facebook/watchman | main | 95 |
For agents
markdown · JSON · MCP: product_card(name="facebook/watchman")
Data as of 2026-08-30T08:39:29.467469+00:00 · Report a problem