reticle_query finds elements. reticle_inspect tells you everything about one of them. It is the tool that turns a finding into an edit, because it ends with a file and a line number.
Example
What each block is for
component is the payoff. The stack ["Sidebar", "App", "QueryClientProvider"] tells your agent where this element lives in the tree, and source tells it which file to open. This needs @reticlehq/react; without it you still get everything else.
theme catches a bug class most tools cannot see. colorToken: "--muted" means this colour came from your design system. offTheme: false means nothing here is a hardcoded hex that slipped past review. An agent that pastes color: #939AA8 instead of using the token produces a change that looks identical and quietly forks your design system. This field is how that gets caught.
occluded is the difference between “visible” and “actually clickable”. An element can be present, visible and enabled while sitting under a modal overlay. states will look perfect; occluded: true is the honest answer.
box is geometry in CSS pixels. Useful for layout assertions and for working out whether something is off-screen rather than hidden.
When to reach for it
A click did nothing
Check
occluded and states before assuming the handler is broken. Very often the handler is
fine and something is sitting on top of it.You need to edit the code
component.source is the file and line. This is the fastest path from symptom to diff.A style looks wrong
theme.offTheme tells you whether the value came from your tokens or from somebody’s clipboard.Layout is suspicious
box gives you real geometry, no screenshot and no vision model required.inspect returns one element in detail. If you find yourself inspecting six things in a row, you
probably want reticle_query with attrs instead, one call, six answers.