shiro-neko/docs/development.md

Development

Setup

git clone https://github.com/zakirkun/shiro-neko
cd shiro-neko
bun install

Bun 1.3.14 or newer. Nothing else is required, though rg on PATH makes grep about 15x faster and the fallback path is exercised without it.

Commands

bun run shiro          # run from source
bun run typecheck      # tsc --noEmit
bun test               # 647 tests
bun run build          # single binary for this platform -> dist/shiro
bun run release        # all five platforms -> dist/release + SHA256SUMS
bun run install:local  # build, then copy onto PATH

bun run install:local copies the compiled binary. Do not use bun link: it writes a shim that re-execs bun, which fails on any machine where bun was installed without bun.exe on PATH — an npm install of bun, for instance. The compiled binary embeds its own runtime.

SHIRO_INSTALL_DIR overrides the target directory.

Testing

No mocking framework. Everything is driven through a real boundary.

// The loop: a mock provider, asserting what crossed the wire.
const seen: LanguageModelV4CallOptions[] = [];
const model = new MockLanguageModelV4({
  doStream: async (o) => { seen.push(o); return stream(text('ok')); },
});
const session = new Session({ model, askApproval: async () => 'deny', agent: variantByName('plan') });
for await (const _ of session.send('investigate')) void _;

const offered = (seen[0]?.tools ?? []).map((t) => t.name);
expect(offered).not.toContain('write_file');

// The UI: real keystrokes, asserting what is on screen.
const app = render(<App session={session} bridge={bridge} hooks={testHooks()} header="hdr" />);
app.stdin.write('/');
await wait(120);
expect(app.lastFrame()).toContain('/compact');

Provider wire formats are tested against a local Bun.serve. MCP is tested against a real stdio subprocess. Tools are tested in a temp directory with process.chdir.

SHIRO_HOME points config, sessions, memory, and history at a temp directory, so a test run never touches your real state.

What to assert

Assert on what crossed a boundary: the request body, the rendered frame, the file on disk. Not on internal calls.

That is not style. Several real bugs were caught this way and would have passed a mock-verification test:

• pruneMessages leaving a message item without its reasoning item — visible only in the request body
• pruneMessages leaving a tool result without its tool call — same, and it took a stub endpoint that rejected the pairing to prove the fix
• Compaction blanking the model's memory of its own tool calls — invisible in any single request, and visible only as "the loop ran to its step limit". Caught by asserting the loop terminated because the model chose to, not that the messages had a particular shape
• --json serialising Error as {} — visible only in the printed output
• Automatic approval requests prompting the user — visible only in the event sequence
• ctrl-c killing cmd /c but not the command under it — visible only as elapsed time, since the interrupt reported success while the command ran for another 19 seconds

Adding a tool

1. Define it in src/tools.ts with a zod schema. Descriptions are read by the model, so write them as guidance, not as documentation.
2. Add it to the tools object.
3. Add it to a set in TOOL_SETS. A tool in no set can never be gated off.
4. If it mutates anything, add it to MUTATING_TOOLS so it requires approval.
5. Add a line to TOOL_DOCS in src/prompt.ts saying when to reach for it.
6. If it is read-only, add it to READ_ONLY in src/agents.ts so plan and review can use it.
7. Test the behaviour in a temp directory, including the failure path.

Steps 3 and 4 are two hand-maintained lists of tool names, which is a known weakness: a tool added to one and forgotten in the other is a silently ungated write. Deriving both from the tool definitions is on TODO.md.

Every tool costs roughly 550 characters of schema on every request. Sixteen built-in tools is past where selection accuracy starts to matter, which is why sets exist and why a new tool needs to earn its place — see ROADMAP.md for what has been declined and why. One set, net, is opt-in rather than on: web_fetch is the one tool that leaves the machine.

Adding a slash command

src/commands.ts is the single source of truth. Add a CommandSpec to COMMANDS, a case to parseCommand, and a case in App.tsx. The menu, /help, and the parser all read from that one array, and a test asserts every entry parses and appears in help — they cannot drift.

Code conventions

Sample a neighbouring file before inventing a pattern. Broadly:

• No comment that restates the code. Comments explain why, and usually only where something non-obvious was forced by an external constraint.
• No as any, no @ts-ignore. tsconfig.json runs strict with noUncheckedIndexedAccess.
• Validate at trust boundaries — model output, file contents, network responses. Not between internal functions.
• Duplication over premature abstraction. No interface with one implementation.
• Errors carry what the reader needs to act. oldString appears 3 times in src/x.ts beats edit failed.

Releasing

The version lives in src/version.ts, compiled into the binary. package.json carries it too for tooling, and bun run release refuses to build if the two disagree, or if a git tag disagrees with either:

$ GITHUB_REF_NAME=v9.9.9 bun run release
tag v9.9.9 does not match src/version.ts (0.1.0-beta.4). Bump the version or retag.

A binary reporting the wrong version is worse than a failed release.

To cut one:

# bump src/version.ts and package.json to the same value
git commit -am "release 0.1.0-beta.4"
git tag v0.1.0-beta.4
git push --follow-tags

Cross-compilation is the part that only breaks in CI. bun run release on Windows takes a different branch from the Ubuntu runner — --windows-title is accepted on a Windows host and rejected everywhere else — so a green local release is not proof. buildArgs() is unit-tested for both hosts because of exactly that.

.github/workflows/release.yml then runs typecheck and tests, cross-compiles all five targets on one Ubuntu runner, asserts the built binary reports the expected version, and publishes a GitHub release with the binaries and SHA256SUMS. A tag containing - is published as a prerelease.

Bun cross-compiles from any host, which is why there is no build matrix. Verified: a working darwin-arm64 binary builds on Windows.

Publishing is gated on a v* tag, so a manual workflow_dispatch run produces artifacts without releasing.

CI

.github/workflows/ci.yml runs typecheck, tests, and a build on Ubuntu, macOS, and Windows for every push and PR.

All three are necessary. The tools shell out to rg, git, and a platform shell, and path handling differs — a Windows-only break is invisible on Linux until someone hits it.

Debugging the agent itself

--no-plugins --no-skills --no-memory --no-instructions --no-subagent --no-mcp strips it to the built-in tools alone, which isolates whether a problem is the loop or something layered on it. { "toolSets": [] } narrows it further, to the six core tools.

--json in headless mode shows the exact event sequence.

For provider issues, a local Bun.serve that logs the request body and returns a canned SSE stream answers "what did we actually send" faster than any amount of reading. Several bugs in this codebase were found that way. Making that stub reject the thing you think you fixed is better still: the tool-pairing repair was confirmed by a stub that returned the real 400 for an orphaned result, then stopped doing so.