🍞 Loaf

"Why have just a slice when you can get the whole loaf?"

Loaf is an opinionated agentic framework that gives AI coding assistants structured knowledge, enforced tool boundaries, and a coherent workflow from idea to implementation to learning. Write your skills once, deploy to Claude Code, OpenCode, Cursor, Codex, and Amp.

Portable knowledge — Skills cover workflows, engineering standards, and language expertise. Build once, deploy to supported AI coding tools without rewriting anything.

Project journal model — A single SQLite-backed journal captures decisions and progress across every conversation, project-scoped and correlated by an opaque harness id. There is no session entity to open or close, so concurrent conversations across branches and worktrees stay conflict-free. Handoff artifacts live separately in .agents/handoffs/. Work survives context loss, compaction, and /clear.

Change-first workflow — The Loaf Flow is pitch → shape → implement → ship → release. /pitch authors a problem-space brief; /shape bounds a Change under docs/changes/YYYYMMDD-slug/ (promoting a capture in place when needed). loaf change check validates the contract before implementation, review, and shipping.

Profile-based agents — Functional profiles are defined by tool access, not job titles. A Smith with python-development skills becomes a backend engineer; the same Smith with infrastructure-management becomes a DevOps engineer. Skills determine what an agent knows; the profile determines what it can touch.

Conversation continuity — Pick up exactly where you left off with full traceability. The project journal captures decisions and progress in SQLite; a derived, ephemeral digest (latest wrap + recent branch entries + open tasks) is emitted at conversation start. Explicit transfer packets live in .agents/handoffs/ until housekeeping deletes them after deprecation.

Hooks as quality gates — Two hook types: enforcement hooks (pre-commit secrets scanning, pre-push linting) block bad commits automatically; skill instruction hooks inject context at tool invocation time. Language-aware and automatic.

Loaf keeps intent, implementation, and learning connected:

┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│                    PITCH AND SHAPE                          │
│                                                             │
│     /pitch → brief → /shape → Change (or /bootstrap)        │
│                                                             │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
                              ↓
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│                     IMPLEMENT AND SHIP                      │
│                                                             │
│                 /implement → review → /ship                 │
│                                                             │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
                              ↓
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│                 RELEASE AND PRESERVE                        │
│                                                             │
│     /release · journal · /reflect · optional /wrap          │
│                                                             │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

Discover the problem, author a brief, then bound an implementable Change (or bootstrap a project from a pitched BRIEF).

Implement a coherent Change through contained branches and pull requests, review the result, and land it deliberately.

Integrate outcomes into strategic knowledge.

CLI commands that support the workflow:

Loaf uses functional profiles defined by mechanically enforced tool boundaries — not role titles, not domain labels. What an agent can do is fixed by its profile. What it knows comes from skills loaded at spawn time.

The main conversation is the Warden — it coordinates and delegates but never implements directly. See SOUL.md for the full fellowship identity.

Skills you invoke directly to drive work forward.

Explore and brainstorm are agent techniques (not user slash entry); agents reach for them when direction is undecided — human entry intent routes to /pitch.

Background skills that activate automatically during agent coordination and project management.

Background knowledge that activates automatically to enforce quality.

Domain expertise that loads based on project context.

Build once, deploy everywhere. Skills are the universal layer; profiles and hooks adapt per target.

brew tap levifig/tap
brew install loaf

Homebrew installs the native loaf binary plus Loaf's packaged content under the tap-managed prefix. Use brew upgrade loaf after releases.

/plugin marketplace add levifig/loaf

Updates happen automatically via plugin marketplace. Commands are scoped under loaf: (e.g., /loaf:implement).

npx github:levifig/loaf install

Detects installed tools, lets you select targets, and installs pre-built distributions. To bring an existing installation current afterwards, run loaf upgrade — it syncs every installed harness from anywhere, and refreshes project files only inside a Loaf repo. Codex's optional outside-sandbox policy is explicit: loaf install --to codex --codex-basic-commands installs only centrally classified basic command leaves with absolute executable prefixes; unclassified and operator commands remain gated. Other harness adapters are not implied by this policy.

Projects created with the older TypeScript runtime can keep using their existing .agents/ Markdown files after installing the native Go runtime. If no SQLite database exists yet, Loaf runs supported task, spec, report, journal, and housekeeping commands in markdown-only compatibility mode.

Use this sequence when you are ready to adopt SQLite-backed state:

loaf state status
loaf migrate markdown --dry-run
loaf migrate markdown --apply
loaf state status

The dry run counts importable artifacts and skipped files without creating a database. The apply step imports .agents/ Markdown into the XDG data-home SQLite database without rewriting the source Markdown files. Loaf uses one global SQLite file and partitions rows by stable project ID, so multiple projects share the same database path while project queries stay isolated. Project IDs are not bound to the checkout path or friendly name; use loaf project rename <name> for display names and loaf project move --from <old-path> after moving a checkout. Newer graph-oriented commands such as loaf idea, loaf spark, loaf tag, loaf bundle, and loaf link require initialized SQLite state; run loaf state init for a fresh project or loaf migrate markdown --apply for an existing Markdown project.

Loaf keeps recovery claims explicit. local_rollback is the default same-data-home snapshot for local corruption rollback; project-scoped replay remains the ordinary migration rollback path; and external_disaster_copy is an operator-selected non-temporary external destination that may help with data-home or device loss but does not prove physical off-device durability. Every backup reports its resolved destination, checksum, SQLite validity, journal retrieval readiness, recovery readiness, and latest canonical journal watermark. device_loss_protected remains false because selecting a path is not evidence that it is remote or durable.

Create and verify backups with loaf state backup, loaf state backup --to /absolute/external/directory, and loaf state backup verify <backup>. Use loaf state backup restore <backup> --to /absolute/empty/rehearsal/loaf.sqlite for an isolated disposable rehearsal; the command proves an exact copy, integrity, foreign-key, schema, project, journal, search-parity, and watermark match without opening or mutating the live database.

Activating a verified copy is a manual, quiesced operator procedure, not an automated restore command:

1. Stop or terminate every Loaf process, harness, background writer, and related service, then verify universal quiescence before any quarantine or activation step. Loaf has no automated live mutation lease and makes no concurrent-restore claim.
2. Verify the durable backup and complete the isolated disposable rehearsal, then create and retain a preserve-current backup before changing the live data home.
3. While all writers remain quiesced, move the old main database and any matching -wal and -shm sidecars together into a durable quarantine. Never mix sidecars from different database files, and never move only the main file when a sidecar belongs to it.
4. Install the verified copy at the resolved live database path with mode 0600, start current Loaf, and run loaf state doctor, loaf state status, and a known journal retrieval check.
5. If validation fails, quiesce again and activate the preserve-current copy using the same procedure; do not continue with concurrent writers.

Install locations:

Claude Code only.

Recommended MCP Servers: Linear (issue tracking). Optional: Serena (semantic editing for large codebases — most code intelligence is now built into Claude Code's native LSP). Not bundled — loaf install will detect and recommend missing MCPs.

LSP Servers: gopls, pyright, typescript-language-server, solargraph

git clone https://github.com/levifig/loaf.git
cd loaf
npm install
npm run build

See AGENTS.md for development guidelines.

npm run typecheck    # Type check
npm run test         # Run tests
loaf build           # Build all targets (after initial npm run build)
loaf install --to all  # Install to detected tools

Testing locally:

• Claude Code: /plugin marketplace add /path/to/loaf
• Others: loaf install --to all (after npm link)

MIT