Summary

Ralph TUI is a terminal UI orchestrator designed to automate the execution of AI coding agents through task lists. It connects AI assistants like Claude Code and OpenCode to task trackers, enabling autonomous project development with intelligent task selection, error handling, and real-time visibility, benefiting developers seeking to streamline AI-assisted workflows.

How It Works

The core of Ralph TUI operates on a five-step autonomous loop: selecting the highest-priority task, building a detailed prompt for the AI agent, executing the agent, detecting task completion, and then proceeding to the next task. This iterative process is managed by an execution engine that supports various task trackers (e.g., prd.json, Beads) and AI agents. The system emphasizes real-time feedback through its TUI, allowing users to monitor progress, control execution, and inspect nested agent calls, offering a transparent and interactive development experience.

Quick Start & Requirements

Installation is straightforward using the Bun JavaScript runtime: bun install -g ralph-tui. Project setup is initiated with ralph-tui setup, followed by running tasks, for example, ralph-tui run --prd ./prd.json. Key dependencies include Bun. Comprehensive documentation, guides, and examples are available at ralph-tui.com.

Highlighted Details

• Task Management: Integrates with simple prd.json files and more complex git-backed Beads trackers, supporting dependency management.
• AI Agent Support: Natively supports Claude Code and OpenCode, with extensibility for others via plugins.
• Interactive TUI: Provides real-time visualization of agent output, task progress, and subagent tracing, controllable via keyboard shortcuts.
• Resilience: Features session persistence, allowing users to pause and resume work, surviving crashes.
• Extensibility: Offers a plugin system for agents and trackers, and uses Handlebars for prompt templating.

Maintenance & Community

The project is open-source under the MIT license. While the README acknowledges the inspiration from Geoffrey Huntley's original concept, it does not detail specific community channels (like Discord/Slack) or highlight major contributors or sponsorships.

Licensing & Compatibility

Licensed under the permissive MIT License, allowing for broad use, modification, and distribution, including in commercial applications.

Limitations & Caveats

The provided README does not explicitly detail known limitations, alpha status, or specific unsupported platforms. Users should consult the project's issue tracker for potential bugs or feature gaps.