Built CLI Tools to Browse AI Coding Assistant Logs (Claude Code & Codex CLI)

hiroshi yata — Thu, 18 Dec 2025 23:58:05 +0000

The Problem

If you're using AI coding assistants like Claude Code or OpenAI Codex CLI, you've probably had this experience:

"What was that solution Claude suggested last week?"
"How did I phrase that prompt that worked so well?"

Both tools store conversation logs locally, but finding past sessions is painful:

# Claude Code logs
~/.claude/projects/<project-hash>/*.jsonl

# Codex CLI logs  
~/.codex/sessions/YYYY/MM/DD/*.jsonl

Navigating these nested directories manually? No thanks.

The Solution

I built two simple shell scripts that use fzf for interactive log browsing:

claude-logs - for Claude Code
codex-logs - for OpenAI Codex CLI

Each is a single file (~200 lines), requires only fzf and jq, and works out of the box.

Features

Both tools share the same command structure:

Command	Description
`(no args)`	Interactive mode - browse with fzf
`list`	Show all projects/months
`latest`	View the most recent session
`tail`	Watch active session in real-time
`status`	Check if CLI is running

Quick Demo

Interactive Mode

$ claude-logs
# → Select project with fzf
# → Select session with fzf
# → View formatted conversation

Real-time Monitoring

$ claude-logs tail
# → Watch the active session live (Ctrl+C to exit)

Status Check

$ claude-logs status
Claude Code is running (PID: 12345)

Recent sessions:
  2025-12-18 15:30 - my-project
  2025-12-18 14:00 - another-project

Output Format

Raw JSONL logs are transformed into readable conversations:

━━━━━━━━━━ USER ━━━━━━━━━━
Fix the bug in this function

━━━━━━━━━━ CLAUDE ━━━━━━━━━━
I found the issue. The problem is...

🔧 [Tool: Edit file]

For Codex CLI, you also get project path and git branch info:

=== rollout-xxx.jsonl ===
Project: /Users/me/my-project | Branch: main

Installation

Prerequisites

brew install fzf jq

Install claude-logs

git clone https://github.com/wondercoms/claude-logs.git
chmod +x claude-logs/claude-logs
cp claude-logs/claude-logs ~/.local/bin/

Install codex-logs

git clone https://github.com/wondercoms/codex-logs.git
chmod +x codex-logs/codex-logs
cp codex-logs/codex-logs ~/.local/bin/

Note: Make sure ~/.local/bin is in your PATH.

How It Works

The tools are straightforward:

Scan the log directory structure
Parse JSONL files with jq to extract messages
Display options with fzf (with preview!)
Format output with ANSI colors

The fzf preview feature is key - you can see conversation snippets before opening:

fzf --preview 'head -20 {} | jq -r "..."'

Use Cases

1. Reference Past Solutions

Find how you solved a similar problem before.

2. Reuse Effective Prompts

Discover prompts that worked well and adapt them.

3. Daily Review

Review what you accomplished with AI assistance today.

4. Debugging

Check logs when the AI CLI behaves unexpectedly.

Current Limitations

macOS only (uses stat -f for timestamps)
Linux support would need stat --format - PRs welcome!

Wrapping Up

If you're a heavy user of Claude Code or Codex CLI, give these tools a try. They're simple, dependency-light, and solve a real annoyance.

Found a bug? Want Linux support? Issues and PRs are welcome!

What tools do you use to manage your AI coding assistant workflows? Let me know in the comments!

DEV Community: hiroshi yata