local-agent

README

local-agent

A local-first coding agent for the terminal, built in Go with Charm and powered by local Ollama models.

Website · Getting started · Safety · Ecosystem · Expert teams

Status: alpha. local-agent can inspect a repository, edit files, run commands, use MCP tools, and retain optional cross-session memory. Run it in a clean Git worktree, read every approval request, and review the resulting diff. The current safety layer is useful, but it is not an operating-system sandbox.

  NORMAL -> interactive work; changes require approval
  PLAN   -> inspect and design without mutations
  AUTO   -> proactive work under the same approval policy

What works today

• A responsive terminal UI built with Bubble Tea v2, Bubbles v2, Lip Gloss v2, and Glamour.
• Streaming chat through Ollama with an availability-aware local model router.
• Qwen 3.5, Phi-4 Mini, and manually selected Ornith/Gemma/Qwen exclusive profiles.
• Read, search, diff, validated patch, atomic write, file-management, and shell tools.
• NORMAL, PLAN, and AUTO authority with approval prompts for risky operations.
• STDIO, SSE, and Streamable HTTP MCP tool servers, including an MCPHub gateway.
• Contextual MCPHub routing with explicit confident, ambiguous, and no-match outcomes.
• Read-only Team, Swarm, and application-level MoE consultations whose concurrency adapts to host CPU and memory.
• Process-local read grants for an exact external file or directory, without widening write authority.
• Project instructions from AGENTS.md with legacy AGENT.md fallback.
• Lossless SQLite session resume, native reasoning display, skills, agent profiles, optional ICE retrieval, checkpoints, logs, and terminal behavior tests.

Quick start

Prerequisites

• Go 1.25.12 or newer
• Ollama running on the same machine
• Task for repository development commands (optional)
• MCPHub, Cortex, Obsidian, or other MCP servers only if you want those tools

Release binaries target macOS and Linux. Windows is not published yet because graceful cancellation must terminate complete subprocess trees, which requires a Job Object implementation rather than Go's direct-process fallback.

Start Ollama in one terminal:

ollama serve

Pull the default model. The 4B tier is optional but recommended for coding work:

ollama pull qwen3.5:2b
ollama pull qwen3.5:4b

Install and launch:

go install github.com/abdul-hamid-achik/local-agent/cmd/local-agent@latest
local-agent

Or run this checkout directly:

go run ./cmd/local-agent

Resume an exact saved session, or the newest one for the current canonical workspace, when opening the interactive TUI:

local-agent --resume 42
local-agent --resume latest

--resume accepts only a positive session ID or latest and cannot be combined with headless -p/--prompt. Loading restores the saved database title and conversation state after TUI startup; it does not submit a prompt or automatically continue a durable goal.

No configuration file is required for the basic Ollama-only experience. To start from the annotated configuration:

mkdir -p ~/.config/local-agent
cp config.example.yaml ~/.config/local-agent/config.yaml

The example enables an mcphub command. Comment out that server entry if MCPHub is not installed.

Local model setup

local-agent asks Ollama for its authoritative inventory at startup, including local weights and Ollama Cloud aliases. Automatic routing uses only admitted local models; Cloud remains an explicit, confirmed choice.

Approximate artifact sizes vary by Ollama build and quantization:

Model	Approx. size	Intended role	Automatic routing
qwen3.5:0.8b	1.0 GB	Very short answers and lightweight classification; weak autonomous tool use	Eligible
qwen3.5:2b	2.7 GB	Compact interactive answers and modest tool chains	Eligible
phi4-mini:latest	2.5 GB	Alternative compact reasoning/tool profile	Fallback eligible
qwen3.5:4b	3.4 GB	Preferred coding, debugging, review, and multi-step tools	Eligible
qwen3.5:9b	6.6 GB	Deep manual profile	No; exclusive
ornith:latest	5.6 GB	Agentic coding and independent deep verification	No; exclusive
gemma4:e2b	7.2 GB	Alternative manual reasoning/tool profile	No; exclusive

Pull whichever profiles you intend to use:

ollama pull qwen3.5:0.8b
ollama pull qwen3.5:2b
ollama pull qwen3.5:4b
ollama pull phi4-mini:latest

# Manual exclusive profiles on a 16 GB machine:
ollama pull qwen3.5:9b
ollama pull ornith:latest
ollama pull gemma4:e2b

# Required only when ICE is enabled:
ollama pull nomic-embed-text

ollama list

The shipped memory guard is tuned for a 16 GB Apple-silicon machine:

• num_ctx: 16384 is the recommended 2B/4B default.
• Qwen 9B, Ornith 9B, and Gemma E2B are explicit profiles. Switching models asks Ollama to unload the previous active chat model first.
• Gemma E4B+ and local weights above the default 16 GB-oriented profile remain blocked unless explicitly overridden.
• Ollama Cloud models remain visible while privacy.local_only: true. Manual selection asks for exact, conversation-only consent; automatic routing remains local.
• LOCAL_AGENT_ALLOW_LARGE_MODELS=1 bypasses the size guard. Use it only after measuring memory headroom; it does not add memory isolation.

Automatic and pinned models

The interactive TUI starts with automatic routing. Choosing a model or agent profile inside the TUI pins that model; /model auto releases the pin. Startup --model and profile model selections remain pinned in the TUI too.

/model                     open the live Ollama inventory
/model list                list models currently admitted from Ollama
/model qwen3.5:4b          switch and pin this model
/model auto                release the pin and resume automatic routing

Selecting a model in the picker also pins it. Ollama's /api/tags inventory is the source of truth, including custom local models and Ollama Cloud aliases. The picker groups local, cloud, remote, and policy-blocked entries; d opens capabilities/runtime details and a opens the cancellable pull form. Static model configuration is retained only as routing preference metadata. Cloud is never selected automatically across the privacy boundary.

The --qwen-router CLI flag enables a more detailed Qwen-specific heuristic router and remains experimental.

Operating modes

Cycle modes with shift+tab.

Mode	Model behavior	Available tools
NORMAL	Routes for the interactive task	Read tools, writes, validated edits, shell, memory, and MCP; mutations remain approval-gated
PLAN	Sends ordinary prompts directly under a read-only host policy	Workspace reads, search, listing, diff, existence checks, memory recall, and advisory expert consultation only
AUTO	Sends ordinary prompts directly with proactive tool routing	The NORMAL tool surface under the same approval policy; no blanket approval

The mode policy is enforced by the host, not just by a prompt. A model-generated mutation in PLAN is returned as blocked. shift+tab only changes authority; it never opens a form or creates work. Ordinary prompts are sent immediately in all three modes. AUTO does not skip approvals: risky operations still follow the configured approval policy. A durable bounded run is created only through /goal <duration> <prompt> or /goal new, and an active goal is controlled through the Goal Inspector instead of accepting an ordinary prompt that could bypass its permit and budget. Legacy ASK sessions restore as NORMAL. Legacy BUILD sessions restore as NORMAL unless they already carry a durable goal, in which case they restore as AUTO.

When enabled, consult_experts is a read-only tool in every mode. It can run at most one bounded Team, Swarm, or application-level MoE consultation per parent turn, but child experts receive no filesystem, shell, memory, or MCP tools. In a bounded turn, their evaluation usage shares the parent turn or Goal budget. The parent agent retains all authority and must verify their advisory reports.

Active /goal runs currently use the foreground Bubble Tea Goal Runtime. The UI-independent internal/supervisor and internal/workunit packages are validated scheduling contracts, not wired execution engines: there is no headless run --until-blocked, queue, or parallel specialist process runner.

Safety and privacy boundaries

The default configuration sets:

privacy:
  local_only: true

With that setting, local-agent:

• Rejects Ollama URLs outside local-machine hosts (localhost, loopback IPs, and unspecified bind aliases).
• Rejects SSE and Streamable HTTP MCP URLs outside those local-machine hosts.
• Shows Ollama Cloud entries for explicit selection, asks before crossing the boundary, and excludes them from automatic routing.
• Canonicalizes built-in file paths, resolves symlinks, and requires a temporary exact-file or directory read grant outside the startup workspace.
• Applies .agentignore to built-in file operations.
• Removes most parent-process environment variables before running the built-in shell tool.
• Starts STDIO MCP servers with a minimal environment and deterministic local executable lookup.

Approval policy

The following operations require approval by default:

• write, edit, bash, mkdir, remove, copy, and move
• memory_save, memory_update, and memory_delete
• Every MCP tool call

The TUI replaces the composer with an inline permission surface while keeping the transcript visible. It shows a bounded action preview, target or command, and an inline diff for supported file changes. Respond with:

• y to allow once
• n to deny
• s to allow the identical request again during the current Agent process
• d to switch between the preview and exact arguments
• esc to cancel the approval and active turn

Read/search tools stay inside the workspace but do not prompt. The s grant is bound to the exact canonical arguments and is not persisted across process restarts. There is no broad per-tool “always allow” choice in the TUI.

What local-only does not guarantee

privacy.local_only validates configured network endpoints; it is not an egress firewall:

• An approved bash command can use absolute paths, leave the workspace, start subprocesses, or access the network.
• A trusted STDIO MCP server, including MCPHub or Cortex, is a separate process and may read files or contact services according to its own configuration.
• MCP tools can have side effects outside the repository.

Do not describe the current alpha as “data can never leave the machine” unless the agent and every approved subprocess are also running inside an OS/container network sandbox.

--skip-approvals skips approval prompts, but explicit deny policies, host validation, workspace/scope limits, privacy checks, tool preflight, and the execution ledger still apply. In non-interactive -p/--prompt mode, requests that need an approval fail closed by default because there is no approval UI. Use the flag only for a trusted request in a disposable or well-versioned workspace. --yolo remains a deprecated compatibility alias for --skip-approvals.

MCPHub, Cortex, and other MCP tools

local-agent is a generic MCP client. The recommended intelligence-stack setup is to expose Cortex, Obsidian, and other specialist servers through one local MCPHub process:

servers:
  - name: mcphub
    command: mcphub
    args: [mcp, serve, --agent, local-agent]

Configure Cortex, Obsidian, and the rest of your catalog inside MCPHub using their own installation instructions. Then:

1. Start local-agent.
2. Check startup status or run /servers.
3. Use NORMAL for interactive MCP work, AUTO for proactive work, or /goal for a bounded durable run.
4. Review and approve each MCP call.

local-agent intentionally keeps Cortex orchestration behind MCPHub instead of embedding a second intelligence stack. Cortex analysis, investigation, and delegation appear as namespaced MCP tools. MCPHub owns lazy discovery, authentication, and downstream policy; local-agent owns the final user approval and transcript.

Every exposed MCP tool is namespaced as <server>__<tool>. Exact structured output stays inside the agent parser boundary and is discarded after known tool-specific interpretation rather than copied into transcript or saved-card text. Known integrations produce bounded semantic projections; media and resource blocks are likewise bounded instead of flooding a small model or session state with base64.

You can also configure direct servers:

servers:
  - name: local-tools
    command: /absolute/path/to/mcp-server
    args: [serve]

  - name: local-http-tools
    transport: streamable-http
    url: http://127.0.0.1:8812/mcp

Supported transports are STDIO (default), SSE, and Streamable HTTP. Servers connect concurrently at startup; failed servers do not prevent the TUI from opening, and a background health monitor attempts reconnection.

Configuration

Configuration is loaded from the first matching file:

1. ./local-agent.yaml
2. ./local-agent.yml
3. $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/local-agent/config.yaml
4. $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/local-agent/config.yml
5. $HOME/.config/local-agent/config.yaml
6. $HOME/.config/local-agent/config.yml

Repository-local configuration therefore has the highest precedence. The XDG locations are considered when XDG_CONFIG_HOME is an absolute path; the $HOME/.config locations remain the portable fallback. If XDG already points to $HOME/.config, duplicate paths are checked only once. Files are not merged: the first matching file is loaded, then environment overrides are applied.

A compact configuration is:

ollama:
  model: qwen3.5:2b
  base_url: http://localhost:11434
  num_ctx: 16384

privacy:
  local_only: true

model:
  default_model: qwen3.5:2b
  fallback_chain:
    - qwen3.5:2b
    - phi4-mini:latest
    - qwen3.5:0.8b
    - qwen3.5:4b
  auto_select: true
  embed_model: nomic-embed-text

tools:
  timeout: 30s
  max_grep_results: 500
  max_iterations: 10

# Read-only Team, Swarm, and application-level MoE consultation.
experts:
  enabled: true

# Disabled by default. Pull nomic-embed-text before enabling.
ice:
  enabled: false

servers: []

See config.example.yaml for the configured model catalog and MCP examples.

Environment variables

Variable	Purpose
OLLAMA_HOST	Override ollama.base_url
LOCAL_AGENT_MODEL	Override the initial Ollama model
LOCAL_AGENT_AGENTS_DIR	Override the agents directory
LOCAL_AGENT_TOOLS_TIMEOUT	Override the built-in tool timeout
LOCAL_AGENT_TOOLS_MAX_GREP	Override maximum grep results
LOCAL_AGENT_TOOLS_MAX_ITER	Override maximum ReAct iterations
LOCAL_AGENT_ICE_EMBED_MODEL	Override the ICE embedding model
LOCAL_AGENT_LOCAL_ONLY	Enable or disable local-machine endpoint enforcement
LOCAL_AGENT_ALLOW_LARGE_MODELS	Bypass the 16 GB-oriented model/context guard
LOCAL_AGENT_REDUCED_MOTION	Replace TUI spinners and the waiting shimmer with static activity glyphs

Project instructions, skills, and profiles

At startup, local-agent loads ./AGENTS.md; if absent, it falls back to legacy ./AGENT.md. local-agent init creates AGENTS.md.

Global skills live under the selected shared agents directory, which defaults to:

~/.agents/skills/<name>/SKILL.md

Each SKILL.md may contain YAML frontmatter followed by instructions:

---
name: go-review
description: Review Go changes for correctness and concurrency
---

Check cancellation, races, error handling, and tests.

Manage skills with /skill list, /skill activate <name>, and /skill deactivate <name>. Skill names must be unique. Startup rejects ambiguous names, invalid YAML frontmatter, files over 1 MiB, and symlinked skill files instead of silently choosing or skipping one. ~/.config/local-agent remains reserved for Local Agent configuration and private runtime data; it is not searched for skills. Set agents.dir or LOCAL_AGENT_AGENTS_DIR to select a different shared root. The retired top-level skills_dir setting is rejected with migration guidance.

Inactive skills are exposed to the model as a bounded name-and-description catalog. When one clearly matches the task, the agent can load that exact skill on demand through a read-only built-in tool; the body is not added to every prompt and automatic loading does not activate the skill globally.

The global agent directory uses this layout:

~/.agents/
  agents.md                 # global instructions; instructions.md is also accepted
  mcp.json                  # global MCP servers when config.yaml has none
  agents/
    reviewer/
      agent.yaml
  skills/
    go-review/
      SKILL.md

Agent Skills in this directory use the same frontmatter format shown above. Give each SKILL.md an explicit, unique name; Local Agent uses that declared name for catalog lookup and profile activation.

Example ~/.agents/agents/reviewer/agent.yaml:

name: reviewer
description: Read-only Go reviewer
model: qwen3.5:4b
skills: [go-review]
system_prompt: |
  Focus on correctness, security, concurrency, and missing tests.

Switch with /agent reviewer. A profile model is pinned until /model auto. mcp_servers restricts the model-visible and executable MCP surface to named connected servers; an empty list keeps all configured servers.

Optional memory and ICE

The local memory store is available even when ICE is disabled. It is keyed by canonical workspace, uses owner-only files with interprocess locking and coherent reloads, and fails closed on corrupt data. NORMAL and AUTO expose explicit memory save/update/delete tools, while PLAN exposes recall.

Pre-workspace global memories and ICE entries have no trustworthy project provenance. They remain quarantined, are never attributed to the current repository, and do not add maintenance noise to normal interactive or headless startup.

ICE is opt-in:

ice:
  enabled: true
  embed_model: nomic-embed-text
  # Optional: resolved below managed per-workspace user storage.
  # Absolute paths and parent traversal are rejected.
  # store_path: conversations.json

When enabled, ICE:

• Embeds conversation messages with Ollama.
• Retrieves similar messages from prior sessions.
• Injects retrieved conversations and matching memories into the prompt.
• Runs background extraction for facts, decisions, preferences, and TODOs after completed turns.

Current storage locations:

~/.config/local-agent/conversations.json  # ICE entries; every entry carries a workspace ID
~/.config/local-agent/memory/<hash>.json  # workspace-scoped structured memories
~/.config/local-agent/local-agent.db      # sessions, permissions, checkpoints, usage
~/.config/local-agent/logs/               # structured session logs

Leaving ice.store_path empty uses the managed global ICE file shown above. An explicit relative value is confined beneath ~/.config/local-agent/ice/<workspace-hash>; it cannot select an arbitrary repository directory, enter the Git worktree, or target an outside path.

ICE is still a flat JSON vector store rather than an ANN index, but its bounded writes and reads are interprocess-coherent and retrieval is restricted to the same canonical workspace. Background auto-memory is single-flight, cancelled when foreground inference starts, joined at shutdown, and writes only to that workspace's memory store. Automatic extraction itself does not present a second approval prompt.

CLI reference

Command	Description
local-agent	Open the TUI
local-agent -p "prompt", local-agent --prompt "prompt"	Run one user-directed NORMAL prompt and print text to stdout
local-agent --plan --prompt "prompt"	Run one read-only PLAN prompt; equivalent to --mode plan
local-agent --auto --prompt "prompt"	Run one proactive AUTO prompt; equivalent to --mode auto and does not skip approvals
local-agent --model <name>	Select the initial model; in headless mode this prevents auto-routing
local-agent --agent <name>	Select an initial agent profile
local-agent --resume <id|latest>	Open the TUI and restore an exact or newest current-workspace session
local-agent --qwen-router	Use the experimental Qwen-specific router
local-agent --skip-approvals	Skip approval prompts while retaining explicit denies and host/tool boundaries
local-agent --yolo	Deprecated compatibility alias for --skip-approvals
local-agent init [--force]	Create a project AGENTS.md
local-agent logs	List recent log files
local-agent logs -f	Follow the latest log with tail -f
local-agent goal list [--limit 20] [--json]	List validated durable goals in the current workspace without resuming them
local-agent goal show [--json] <session-id>	Inspect one complete validated goal snapshot
local-agent goal pending [--limit 20] [--json] <session-id>	Inspect unresolved decisions, approvals, and recovery items
local-agent goal recover [--json] <session-id>	Dry-run an existing validated reconciliation group without creating or changing it
local-agent goal recover --apply --item ID --observation VALUE --source VALUE --reference TEXT --summary TEXT --observed-at RFC3339 [--json] <session-id>	Append exact typed recovery evidence through the shared atomic coordinator
local-agent execution recover [--json] <session-id> <execution-id>	Inspect one outcome-unknown execution in an ordinary session without retrying it
local-agent --version	Print the build version

Source builds print dev. Tagged release artifacts print the tag version (for example, 0.4.0), and MCP client handshakes advertise that same build version.

-p and --prompt are exact aliases for a human-readable convenience mode, not a stable JSON automation protocol. --auto and --plan require a non-empty prompt and are mutually exclusive. Passing an explicit empty or whitespace-only prompt exits with status 2 before configuration, network, or provider initialization.

goal list, goal show, goal pending, and the default goal recover dry run are read-only. Recovery mutation requires the complete explicit --apply form, acquires the exact session/workspace lease, and accepts only a member conclusion (effect_applied, effect_not_applied, or effect_compensated) or the turn-parent conclusion turn_abandoned_after_inspection. Evidence sources are external_receipt, workspace_artifact, verification_check, and operator_observation. The timestamp and all evidence fields participate in exact replay identity; changed evidence conflicts. There is no force escape hatch, and a successful recovery ends in PAUSED or EXHAUSTED without resuming provider work. The durable deferred_approval record type is implemented in the store, but foreground approval prompts do not currently enqueue that type. Ordinary sessions without a durable goal use execution recover; its default inspection is read-only, while applying evidence requires the exact revision, event ID, typed observation, source, reference, summary, and timestamp printed by its help. It never retries the original tool.

Slash commands

Command	Description
/help	Open help
/clear, /new	Clear conversation state
/model or /models	Open the model picker
/model list	List admitted models from the live Ollama inventory
/model <name>	Switch and pin an available Ollama model
/model auto	Resume automatic model routing
/agent [name|list]	List or switch profiles
/load <path>, /unload	Asynchronously add or remove one regular, non-symlink markdown context file (32 KB maximum); quoted paths are supported
/scope [list|add-read <directory>|remove-read <path>|clear-read]	Manage process-local read-only access outside the writable workspace; exact files are proposed automatically when referenced in a prompt
/skill, /skill list	List discovered skills and their activation state
/skill activate <name>, /skill deactivate <name>	Add or remove one skill from active prompt context
/servers	Show connected MCP servers and tool count
/ice	Show ICE status
/sessions, /resume	Open the lossless SQLite-backed session picker; neither command accepts an ID argument
/artifacts, /artifact	List bounded file.cheap stash receipts saved in the current session
/goal <duration> <prompt>	Infer bounded criteria and start a concrete goal with that wall-time cap; ambiguity asks one follow-up
/goal [objective], /goal new [objective]	Open the inline reviewed form, optionally prefilled; bare /goal shows an existing goal instead
/goal show	Show objective, acceptance criteria, usage, state, and Cortex linkage
/goal pause, /goal resume	Stop automatic continuation or explicitly resume one user-directed turn
/goal budget	Change automatic-continuation, evaluation-token, and wall-time limits without editing the goal definition
/goal drop	Abandon the goal without claiming completion
/changes	List files modified in the current TUI session
/commit [context]	Generate a message from staged changes and run git commit
/stats	Show in-memory token counters
/export [--force] <path>, /import <path>	Atomically export owner-private Markdown with a typed v2 transcript envelope, or asynchronously import that envelope into a fresh session; replacement requires --force, and tool state is intentionally omitted
/checkpoint [label]	Save the current agent message history to SQLite
/checkpoints	List checkpoints
/restore <id>	Replace agent history with a checkpoint
/recover	Review the current session's outcome-unknown execution and record typed evidence
/exit	Quit

Slash commands use a small argument parser, not a shell. Single or double quotes and backslash-escaped whitespace can group an argument, while environment variables and command substitutions remain literal. /load, /scope, /import, and /export separately expand a leading ~/. An unterminated quote is rejected before the command runs. Documented arity is enforced: commands with no arguments and /goal show, /goal pause, /goal resume, /goal budget, or /goal drop reject trailing fields, while /restore accepts exactly one canonical positive decimal ID.

/commit deliberately disables Git hooks, commit signing, configured fsmonitor helpers, pagers, and automatic maintenance/GC for its owned Git subprocesses. It still uses your Git identity and other non-executing configuration. Run git commit yourself when repository hooks or signing are required.

Session snapshots preserve model-facing messages, tool-call IDs, tool cards, mode, model, profile, counters, and bounded artifact receipts. Loading one replaces both the visible transcript and the hidden model conversation. Checkpoints are validated against the active session. /artifacts shows only host-normalized stash URIs, counts, timestamps, hashes, and static warning flags; raw file.cheap manifests, paths, and provider prose do not enter session state.

Durable goals and bounded continuation

/goal <duration> <prompt> is the compact path: it deterministically infers a bounded objective and prompt-specific acceptance criteria, applies only the explicit wall-time cap, and starts the first AUTO turn when the prompt names a concrete target. Obvious ambiguity asks one contextual follow-up before any runtime exists. /goal new opens the manual host-owned Goal Runtime review from an empty or partial definition. Every definition requires an objective, at least one independently checkable acceptance criterion, and at least one finite limit. Later automatic turns are admitted only after the previous turn produced a successful tool receipt and the linked Cortex case advanced semantically. Each continuation permit is saved with the exact agent TurnID before provider dispatch. The remaining evaluation-token allowance is sent to every Ollama request as a hard generation cap, and the remaining wall allowance becomes the turn context deadline; both are rechecked before any later tool dispatch. Evaluation-token and wall-time limits apply to the whole goal; the auto-turn limit applies only to host-initiated continuations, not a new user-directed /goal resume.

Budget exhaustion pauses work; it never means success. A no-tool yield, failed turn, cancellation, unavailable Cortex status, or persistence failure also stops automatic continuation. If a process restarts with an admitted turn but no settled receipt, the goal becomes outcome-unknown and cannot retry that effect automatically. An otherwise active restored goal is paused until the user resumes it. Goal definitions are immutable after creation; /goal budget changes only limits.

/goal show opens the responsive Goal Inspector. It reports the objective, honest criterion proof state, last settled turn, blocker and recovery reason, Cortex revision, persistence health, and remaining budgets. Pause, Resume, Budget, and Drop are derived from the same state-aware action metadata used by slash completion and Help; unavailable actions show their reason, and Drop requires confirmation.

When Cortex is reachable directly or through MCPHub, the runtime links one stable Cortex case and asks for semantic status between productive turns. Cortex receives each local acceptance ID and statement through its typed, immutable acceptanceCriteria field; criteria are never embedded into free-form goal prose. Cortex's structured next action is bounded prompt context for the model—it is never executed directly by the host and still passes through normal tool policy and approval. Local Agent owns scheduling, budgets, cancellation, session persistence, and the execution ledger. A goal reaches completed only when the linked Cortex case is complete with a current canonical verified assessment and no missing, stale, or degraded verification. Every local acceptance ID and statement must have a matching bound named-claim receipt and verifier receipt, and those receipts must match the host's current Git HEAD and dirty-tree digest. The accepted commit, digest, and evidence references remain in the durable completion record. Without Cortex, each bounded turn requires an explicit user resume and the runtime deliberately cannot declare its own completion.

The terminal interface keeps the conversation full-width. Infrequent controls live in transient, keyboard-first overlays: press ctrl+p for session settings, or keep using direct shortcuts and slash commands. Settings open focused child overlays and esc returns to the settings root; overlays opened directly close back to the conversation. Runtime status is scrollable when its diagnostics do not fit on screen. At narrow or short sizes, Settings keeps one-line labels and one selected-detail row so all controls remain scannable. Slash completion shows canonical commands with descriptions while aliases remain searchable. Active work uses one phase-specific animation with elapsed time and a visible cancel affordance; live ToolCards own tool animation, and approval prompts pause background motion until answered. Completed turns briefly show a stable receipt. The supported minimum is 30 columns by 12 rows. Compact status rows preserve skipped-approval, unavailable-MCP, and Cloud/Remote boundaries; minimum-width file approvals keep an identifying target tail plus paging and exact-argument controls.

Keyboard shortcuts

Key	Action
enter, shift+enter	Send / insert a newline
shift+tab	Cycle NORMAL, PLAN, AUTO
ctrl+p	Open session settings (model, profile, mode, sessions, layout, runtime)
ctrl+o	Open Ollama model picker
tab	Complete commands, files, and skills
up, down	Browse input history
pgup, pgdown, ctrl+u, ctrl+d	Scroll conversation
t, space	Toggle all tool details / last tool
ctrl+t	Toggle <think> tag display
ctrl+y	Copy last response
ctrl+e	Edit input with $EDITOR
ctrl+k	Toggle compact mode
esc	Close an overlay or inline form, cancel an approval, or cancel active generation
ctrl+n, ctrl+l	New conversation / clear view
ctrl+c	Quit

Architecture

Charm TUI or headless output
          |
          v
Agent ReAct loop -----> prompt builder + mode policy
    |     |                    |
    |     |                    +-- AGENTS.md, skills, loaded context, memory
    |     |
    |     +-- Tool policy -> permission checker -> built-ins / MCP registry
    |
    +-- Expert selector -> resource plan -> tool-free advisory inference
    |
    +-- Availability-aware ModelManager -> loopback Ollama
                                      |-> chat models
                                      +-> embedding model

Goal Runtime -> durable permits/budgets/receipts -> optional Cortex advisor
     |                                                |
     +-- owns continuation and cancellation           +-- returns semantic state/actions only

Local persistence: scoped JSON memory/ICE + SQLite sessions/permissions/checkpoints + logs

Package layout:

cmd/local-agent/    CLI entry point and startup wiring
internal/agent/     ReAct loop, prompts, policies, tools, hooks, checkpoints
internal/llm/       Ollama client and model manager
internal/mcp/       MCP connections, registry, health checks, reconnects
internal/config/    YAML loading, model catalog, routing, agents, ignore rules
internal/ice/       Embeddings, retrieval, context budget, auto-memory
internal/memory/    Persistent structured memory
internal/db/        SQLite schema and queries
internal/skill/     Skill discovery and activation
internal/command/   Slash and custom commands
internal/goal/      Durable goal lifecycle, budgets, receipts, and recovery
internal/goaladvisor/ Bounded Cortex/MCPHub semantic adapter
internal/expertselector/ Deterministic local Team, Swarm, and MoE selection
internal/expertteam/ Bounded read-only expert inference runtime
internal/resource/  Host resource probe and conservative concurrency planner
internal/controlplane/ Append-only exception values and validation
internal/supervisor/ UI-independent scheduling decision contract (not yet wired)
internal/workunit/  Specialist scheduling/admission contract (does not spawn work)
internal/ui/        Charm terminal interface
internal/logging/   Per-run structured logs

Top-level built-in, memory, and MCP calls execute deterministically in model order. The runtime does not parallelize unknown MCP effects. consult_experts is the bounded exception inside one read-only tool call: its tool-free inference reports may run concurrently under the host resource plan.

Alpha limitations and roadmap

Known boundaries are documented here so the TUI does not promise more than the runtime provides:

• Ollama is the only implemented inference adapter. llama.cpp, MLX, and generic local OpenAI-compatible endpoints are not implemented.
• Model routing remains heuristic. Expert fan-out uses measured CPU and memory, including process-visible Linux cgroup limits, where the host exposes them; it has no portable discrete-VRAM or model-specific KV-allocation telemetry. General model admission still uses the conservative 16 GB-oriented guard.
• Small models can emit malformed or repetitive tool calls. Keep important work versioned and inspect every diff.
• privacy.local_only validates endpoints but does not sandbox approved shell or STDIO MCP processes.
• MCP support remains tool-focused; prompts, roots, subscriptions, sampling, and direct multimodal rendering are not yet exposed.
• ICE is workspace-scoped but remains a flat JSON scan rather than a scalable lexical/vector index such as the Cortex/VecLite stack.
• SQLite snapshots and the append-only execution ledger preserve completed state and tool-effect boundaries, but there is no first-class supervisor run/event repository or automatic continuation of in-flight execution after a crash.
• Outcome-reconciliation items now have manual evidence-entry and atomic TUI/CLI resolution workflows. Local Agent still cannot verify an unknown backend outcome automatically, repair a completed-but-unprojected effect automatically, or auto-resume after reconciliation.
• The supervisor and durable specialist work graph remain safety-tested contracts only; headless run-until-blocked, queue/watch/resume controllers, durable evaluation-basis storage, and specialist process execution are not wired. The separate expert runtime is transient, read-only inference consultation rather than durable work-unit execution.
• Native Ollama reasoning and literal <think> tags are displayed separately, but thinking level is not yet configurable per model/profile.
• Headless mode has no structured event stream or granular approval protocol. Without --skip-approvals, requests that need approval fail closed by default.
• There is no OS-level process, filesystem, or network sandbox yet.

The intended direction is a durable turn state machine and typed event stream, MCP effect metadata with bounded read-only concurrency, additional local runtime adapters, and an even stronger diff-first approval UI—while retaining the Go/Charm application.

Development

task build              # bin/local-agent
task run                # build and launch
task dev                # go run ./cmd/local-agent
task test               # go test ./...
task lint               # golangci-lint run ./...
task verify             # Go verification plus production website build
task glyphrun-contracts  # verify every committed spec contract hash
task glyphrun-cli        # fast release-critical terminal contracts
task glyphrun           # complete deterministic terminal suite
task glyphrun-snapshots # refresh intentional TUI snapshots
task site               # local documentation development server
task site:build         # production website build
task site:preview       # build and preview the production website
task clean

Run focused and race tests with:

go test ./internal/agent -run TestName
go test -race ./...

Glyphrun specs under specs/ carry verified contract hashes and cover CLI help/version/init/log behavior, headless authority aliases, exact external-file read review, goal recovery, the normal-width launch, the 30×12 minimum, canonical command discovery, model and approval flows, saved-session receipts, and clean quits.

With qwen3.5:0.8b installed in Ollama, run the opt-in live constrained-model/tool proof separately:

glyph run specs/live_ollama_tool.yml --format md

License

MIT. See LICENSE.