CLI & environment configuration

Where settings come from

Variables are read from the environment with the first match winning:

1. Real environment variables (always win)
2. $DOTENV_CONFIG_PATH, if set
3. ./.env in the current directory (useful in a checkout — copy .env.example)
4. ~/.assisted-review/.env (user-global; use this for a global install)

All .env files are gitignored. You can also pass values inline for a one-off run:

GITLAB_TOKEN=<token> assisted-review namespace/repo!123

Environment variables

Variable	Description
PR_REF	Default ref to open, used by pnpm dev
PRELOAD_CHUNKS	Upcoming chunks to silently preload AI commentary for (default: 1)
PRELOAD_OVERVIEW	Preload the overview's AI summary too (default: true)
ASSISTED_REVIEW_STATE_DIR	Override the state directory (default: ~/.assisted-review/)
ASSISTED_REVIEW_NO_UPDATE_CHECK	Skip the background npm-registry version check on startup
GITLAB_TOKEN / GITLAB_HOST	See GitLab
JIRA_BASE_URL / JIRA_USER / JIRA_TOKEN / JIRA_EPIC_FIELD	See Jira
DOTENV_CONFIG_PATH	Explicit path to a .env file

State directory

Review state — comments, flags, viewed markers, AI notes; one JSON file per PR/MR — lives in ~/.assisted-review/ by default:

ASSISTED_REVIEW_STATE_DIR=/path/to/state

The state dir also holds the user-global .env, the GitLab browser token (mode 0600), the per-repo investigation-access config, and any persistent "always clone" checkouts.

Appearance

Settings offers two independent appearance axes, both persisted in the browser:

• A palette: Blueprint, Paper & Ink, Neon Noir, Mono Brutalist, or Aubergine
• A light/dark mode

Every palette defines both modes, so they compose freely. Syntax-highlighting colors travel with the palette.