cat-claws

Agent-SDK backends for the CatLLM ecosystem: classify text through a Claude subscription (Claude Agent SDK) or a ChatGPT subscription (openai-codex SDK) instead of per-token API billing.

(Distribution name cat-claws; imports as catclaws. Source repo: cat-agent.)

Status: alpha, under active development. See MASTERPLAN.md for the design and step tracker, and OPENAI_MASTERPLAN.md for the Codex backend's execution record.

Install

Each backend's SDK is an extra — install the one(s) you use:

pip install "cat-claws[claude]"   # Claude backend (claude-agent-sdk)
pip install "cat-claws[codex]"    # Codex backend (openai-codex, bundles the codex binary)
pip install "cat-claws[claude,codex]"  # both

A bare pip install cat-claws installs neither SDK; calls then return a clear per-row install hint instead of classifying.

Design in one paragraph

One row = one sealed, fresh-context agent call (no tools, single turn, no settings/AGENTS.md/CLAUDE.md loading), using cat-stack's validated classification prompt byte-for-byte. The model answers in JSON; parsing and the wide 0/1 output matrix reuse cat-stack's existing machinery. Throughput comes from concurrent one-shot calls, never from shared conversations or corpus-in-one-prompt (which would contaminate rows and break research validity).

Quick start

import catclaws

# Claude subscription (requires Claude Code installed and logged in):
df = catclaws.classify(
    input_data=["I moved for a new job", "Rent got too expensive"],
    categories=["Employment", "Cost of living", "Other"],
    description="Why did you move?",
    agent="claude",                 # default; user_model=None -> claude-sonnet-5
)

# ChatGPT subscription (requires `codex login`; the SDK bundles the binary):
df = catclaws.classify(
    input_data=["I moved for a new job", "Rent got too expensive"],
    categories=["Employment", "Cost of living", "Other"],
    description="Why did you move?",
    agent="codex",                  # user_model=None -> gpt-5.5
)

No API key needed for either backend. Engine users reach the same adapters via catstack.classify(..., model_source="claude-agent") / model_source="codex-agent".

Notes for agent="codex": reasoning is explicitly set per call (thinking_budget=0 → effort "none"), so your ~/.codex/config.toml defaults are never silently inherited; image/PDF input is not yet supported on the codex backend (use agent="claude" or an API provider).

Methodology note

The two backends answer the same frozen prompt. On the 24-row synthetic parity run (2026-07-11, benchmarks/parity_run.py) claude-sonnet-5 and gpt-5.5 agreed on 96/96 cells (Cohen's kappa 1.000, 0 errors). Synthetic one-liners are easy; expect some divergence on real survey text — measure and disclose per study (benchmarks/RESULTS.md holds the running record), and never tune the prompt to force agreement.