Glamourous agentic coding for all 💘
# Crush Development Guide
## Project Overview
Crush is a terminal-based AI coding assistant built in Go by
[Charm](https://charm.land). It connects to LLMs and gives them tools to read,
write, and execute code. It supports multiple providers (Anthropic, OpenAI,
Gemini, Bedrock, Copilot, Hyper, MiniMax, Vercel, and more), integrates with
LSPs for code intelligence, and supports extensibility via MCP servers and
agent skills.
The module path is `github.com/charmbracelet/crush`.
## Architecture
```
main.go CLI entry point (cobra via internal/cmd)
internal/
app/app.go Top-level wiring: DB, config, agents, LSP, MCP, events
cmd/ CLI commands (root, run, login, models, stats, sessions)
config/
config.go Config struct, context file paths, agent definitions
load.go crushrc and crush.json loading and validation
provider.go Provider configuration and model resolution
shellconfig/ Bash-powered config format (crushrc builtins)
agent/
agent.go SessionAgent: runs LLM conversations per session
coordinator.go Coordinator: manages named agents ("coder", "task")
hooked_tool.go Decorator that runs PreToolUse hooks before tool execution
prompts.go Loads Go-template system prompts
templates/ System prompt templates (coder.md.tpl, task.md.tpl, etc.)
tools/ All built-in tools (bash, edit, view, grep, glob, etc.)
mcp/ MCP client integration
hooks/ Hook engine: runs user shell commands on hook events
hooks.go Decision types, aggregation logic, event constants
runner.go Parallel hook execution, timeout, dedup
input.go Stdin payload builder, env vars, stdout parsing (Crush + Claude Code compat)
session/session.go Session CRUD backed by SQLite
message/ Message model and content types
db/ SQLite via sqlc, with migrations
sql/ Raw SQL queries (consumed by sqlc)
migrations/ Schema migrations
lsp/ LSP client manager, auto-discovery, on-demand startup
ui/ Bubble Tea v2 TUI (see internal/ui/AGENTS.md)
permission/ Tool permission checking and allow-lists
skills/ Skill file discovery and loading
shell/ Bash command execution with background job support
event/ Telemetry (PostHog)
pubsub/ Internal pub/sub for cross-component messaging
filetracker/ Tracks files touched per session
history/ Prompt history
```
### Key Dependency Roles
- **`charm.land/fantasy`**: LLM provider abstraction layer. Handles protocol
differences between Anthropic, OpenAI, Gemini, etc. Used in `internal/app`
and `internal/agent`.
- **`charm.land/bubbletea/v2`**: TUI framework powering the interactive UI.
- **`charm.land/lipgloss/v2`**: Terminal styling.
- **`charm.land/glamour/v2`**: Markdown rendering in the terminal.
- **`charm.land/catwalk`**: Snapshot/golden-file testing for TUI components.
- **`sqlc`**: Generates Go code from SQL queries in `internal/db/sql/`.
### Key Patterns
- **Config is a Service**: accessed via `config.Service`, not global state.
- **Tools are self-documenting**: each tool has a `.go` implementation and a
`.md` description file in `internal/agent/tools/`.
- **System prompts are Go templates**: `internal/agent/templates/*.md.tpl`
with runtime data injected.
- **Context files**: Crush reads AGENTS.md, CRUSH.md, CLAUDE.md, GEMINI.md
(and `.local` variants) from the working directory for project-specific
instructions.
- **Bash config format**: Crush's primary config format is `crushrc` — a
Bash script using builtins (`provider`, `model`, `mcp`, `lsp`,
`permissions`, `hook`, `options`) to define config. `crush.json` is still
supported but is deprecated in favor of `crushrc` and may be removed in a
future release. Shell config files are discovered alongside JSON configs
and deep-merged through the same pipeline. Builtins are registered via
`shell.RegisterBuiltin` and gated by a `ConfigBuilder` on the context —
they are no-ops during normal bash tool execution. See
`internal/shellconfig/`.
- **Persistence**: SQLite + sqlc. All queries live in `internal/db/sql/`,
generated code in `internal/db/`. Migrations in `internal/db/migrations/`.
- **Pub/sub**: `internal/pubsub` for decoupled communication between agent,
UI, and services.
- **Hooks**: User-defined shell commands in `crushrc` (or `crush.json`)
that fire before tool execution. The engine (`internal/hooks/`) is
independent of fantasy and agent — it takes inputs, runs commands,
returns decisions. The `hookedTool` decorator in
`internal/agent/hooked_tool.go` wraps tools at the coordinator level.
Hooks run before permission checks. See `HOOKS.md` for the user-facing
protocol.
- **CGO disabled**: builds with `CGO_ENABLED=0` and
`GOEXPERIMENT=greenteagc`.
## Build/Test/Lint Commands
- **Build**: `go build .` or `go run .`
- **Test**: `task test` or `go test ./...` (run single test:
`go test ./internal/llm/prompt -run TestGetContextFromPaths`)
- **Update Golden Files**: `go test ./... -update` (regenerates `.golden`
files when test output changes)
- Update specific package:
`go test ./internal/tui/components/core -update` (in this case,
we're updating "core")
- **Lint**: `task lint:fix`
- **Format**: `task fmt` (`gofumpt -w .`)
- **Modernize**: `task modernize` (runs `modernize` which makes code
simplifications)
- **Dev**: `task dev` (runs with profiling enabled)
## Code Style Guidelines
- **Imports**: Use `goimports` formatting, group stdlib, external, internal
packages.
- **Formatting**: Use gofumpt (stricter than gofmt), enabled in
golangci-lint.
- **Naming**: Standard Go conventions — PascalCase for exported, camelCase
for unexported.
- **Types**: Prefer explicit types, use type aliases for clarity (e.g.,
`type AgentName string`).
- **Error handling**: Return errors explicitly, use `fmt.Errorf` for
wrapping.
- **Context**: Always pass `context.Context` as first parameter for
operations.
- **Interfaces**: Define interfaces in consuming packages, keep them small
and focused.
- **Structs**: Use struct embedding for composition, group related fields.
- **Constants**: Use typed constants with iota for enums, group in const
blocks.
- **Testing**: Use testify's `require` package, parallel tests with
`t.Parallel()`, `t.SetEnv()` to set environment variables. Always use
`t.Tempdir()` when in need of a temporary directory. This directory does
not need to be removed.
- **JSON tags**: Use snake_case for JSON field names.
- **File permissions**: Use octal notation (0o755, 0o644) for file
permissions.
- **Log messages**: Log messages must start with a capital letter (e.g.,
"Failed to save session" not "failed to save session").
- This is enforced by `task lint:log` which runs as part of `task lint`.
- **Comments**: End comments in periods unless comments are at the end of the
line.
## Testing with Mock Providers
When writing tests that involve provider configurations, use the mock
providers to avoid API calls:
```go
func TestYourFunction(t *testing.T) {
// Enable mock providers for testing
originalUseMock := config.UseMockProviders
config.UseMockProviders = true
defer func() {
config.UseMockProviders = originalUseMock
config.ResetProviders()
}()
// Reset providers to ensure fresh mock data
config.ResetProviders()
// Your test code here - providers will now return mock data
providers := config.Providers()
// ... test logic
}
```
## Formatting
- ALWAYS format any Go code you write.
- First, try `gofumpt -w .`.
- If `gofumpt` is not available, use `goimports`.
- If `goimports` is not available, use `gofmt`.
- You can also use `task fmt` to run `gofumpt -w .` on the entire project,
as long as `gofumpt` is on the `PATH`.
## Comments
- Comments that live on their own lines should start with capital letters and
end with periods. Wrap comments at 78 columns.
## Committing
- ALWAYS use semantic commits (`fix:`, `feat:`, `chore:`, `refactor:`,
`docs:`, `sec:`, etc).
- Try to keep commits to one line, not including your attribution. Only use
multi-line commits when additional context is truly necessary.
## Working on the TUI (UI)
Anytime you need to work on the TUI, read `internal/ui/AGENTS.md` before
starting work.
## Styling System
The styling system lives in `internal/ui/styles/` and is organized into
three layers:
- **`quickstyle.go`**: The stable base theme builder. `quickStyle(opts)`
constructs a `Styles` struct from `quickStyleOpts` — a palette of
design tokens (primary, secondary, fgBase, bgBase, success, error, etc.).
`quickStyle` must be fully token-driven: never hardcode specific
`charmtone.*` colors here (except Chroma syntax highlighting, which is
pending tokenization). This lets any theme reuse the base without
inheriting Charmtone-specific colors.
- **`themes.go`**: Defines concrete themes. Each theme function (e.g.
`CharmtonePantera`) calls `quickStyle` with its palette, then applies
theme-specific overrides as needed.
- **`styles.go`**: Defines the `Styles` struct and its documentation —
the shape of what `quickStyle` produces.
**Adding theme-specific overrides**: When a style genuinely needs a
color that doesn't fit the token model (e.g. the bang prompt uses
Salt/Hazy/Larple), keep `quickStyle` on the closest semantic token and
override only the differing colors in the theme function:
```go
func CharmtonePantera() Styles {
s := quickStyle(quickStyleOpts{ /* palette */ })
// Override only the colors that differ from the token defaults.
s.Editor.PromptBangIconFocused = s.Editor.PromptBangIconFocused.
Foreground(charmtone.Salt).
Background(charmtone.Hazy)
return s
}
```
**Adding a new theme**: Add a function in `themes.go` that returns the
result of `quickStyle` with a `quickStyleOpts` palette (plus any needed
overrides), then wire it into `ThemeForProvider`.