browsable

browsable audits a Rails application's frontend code and tells you which browsers can actually render and run it — then compares that against the browser policy your app declares. It is the tool that informs Rails 8's allow_browser: instead of declaring what you allow, browsable tells you what your code is genuinely browsable by.

Why

Rails 8 made browser support a first-class, in-framework concern: a controller can declare allow_browser versions: :modern and Rails will turn away anything older. But that declaration is a promise, not a measurement. Nothing checks that your CSS, ERB, and JavaScript actually stay inside it.

browsable is that check. It reads your allow_browser policy, discovers your frontend code the way Propshaft and importmaps lay it out, and reports every feature you use that falls outside the browsers you claim to support — with no package.json and no node_modules in your Rails repo.

The three pieces

This one repository publishes two gems and hosts one Neovim plugin:

browsable/  (this repo)
│
├── browsable/        ─▶  the core gem        — gem install browsable
│                          the CLI, analyzers, Rails-aware glue
│
├── browsable-lsp/    ─▶  the LSP server gem  — gem install browsable-lsp
│                          wraps the core gem as a Language Server,
│                          depends on  ──────────────┐
│                                                    │
├── browsable.nvim/   ─▶  the Neovim plugin         │
│                          installs from git, talks ─┘ to browsable-lsp
│
└── examples/rails_app/   a tiny Rails app for trying browsable out

• browsable — the core gem. A CLI and a thin Ruby orchestrator over best-in-class external tools (Herb for ERB, stylelint for CSS, eslint-plugin-compat for JavaScript). browsable owns no parsing or compat-data logic; its value is the Rails-aware glue. → browsable/README.md
• browsable-lsp — a Language Server Protocol server built on the core gem, so any LSP-capable editor shows compatibility diagnostics as you type. → browsable-lsp/README.md
• browsable.nvim — a small pure-Lua Neovim plugin that wires browsable-lsp into Neovim and adds a few convenience commands. → browsable.nvim/README.md

Quick start

The 90% case — install the gem, check your tooling, audit:

gem install browsable
browsable doctor      # checks (and can install) stylelint / eslint / node
browsable audit       # audits the Rails app in the current directory

Inside a Rails app, add it to the Gemfile instead and run bundle exec browsable audit. browsable runs with zero configuration — it infers everything. A config/browsable.yml is only for overriding defaults (rails g browsable:install generates a commented one).

Want to see it work first? The repo ships a fixture:

cd browsable && bundle install
bundle exec exe/browsable audit ../examples/rails_app

About the monorepo

This single GitHub repository publishes two independent gems to rubygems.org and is the source for the Neovim plugin. You do not need to clone anything to use browsable:

• gem install browsable and gem install browsable-lsp pull from rubygems. Each gem's .gemspec declares only the files in its own subdirectory and points source_code_uri at that subdirectory of this repo.
• The Neovim plugin installs straight from this repo's git URL with a subdirectory specifier — see browsable.nvim/README.md.

There are no git submodules and no nested repositories — just subdirectories.

Releasing

Each gem releases on its own tag. Pushing browsable-v0.1.0 triggers release-browsable.yml; pushing browsable-lsp-v0.1.0 triggers release-browsable-lsp.yml. The tag prefix selects the gem.

First release: the names browsable and browsable-lsp must be claimed on rubygems.org. There is no separate "reserve a name" step — claim each name by running gem push on it once (a 0.0.1 placeholder, or just the real first release).

Future directions

• MCP server. The CLI's --json output is a stable, structured interface designed to be consumed by tools — the LSP server already does. An MCP server exposing the same audit to AI agents is a natural next step; the JSON format is the foundation for it.
• Editor code actions. "Add an @supports fallback" / "Tighten allow_browser to require Safari 15.4+" as one-click quick fixes.

License

MIT — a single license at the repo root covers every package in the monorepo.