kader 2.7.6

kader coding agent

Kader

Kader is an intelligent coding agent designed to assist with software development tasks. It provides a comprehensive framework for building AI-powered agents with advanced reasoning capabilities and tool integration.

Features

• 🤖 AI-powered Code Assistance - Support for multiple LLM providers:
  • Ollama: Local LLM execution for privacy and speed.
  • Ollama Cloud: Cloud-based models via ollama.com.
  • Google Gemini: Cloud-based powerful models via the Google GenAI SDK.
  • Anthropic: High-quality Claude models via the Anthropic SDK.
• 🖥️ Interactive CLI - Modern terminal interface built with Rich & prompt_toolkit:
  • Beautiful Output: Markdown rendering, styled panels, and dynamic tables.
  • Interactive Tools: Built-in interactive prompts for model selection and tool confirmation.
• 🛠️ Tool Integration - File system, command execution, web search, and more.
• 🧠 Memory Management - State persistence, conversation history, and isolated sub-agent memory.
• 🔁 Session Management - Save and load conversation sessions.
• ⌨️ Keyboard Shortcuts - Efficient navigation and operations.
• 📝 YAML Configuration - Agent configuration via YAML files.
• 🔄 Planner-Executor Framework - Sophisticated reasoning and acting architecture using task planning and delegation.
• 🗂️ File System Tools - Read, write, search, and edit files with automatic .gitignore filtering.
• 🤝 Agent-As-Tool - Spawn sub-agents for specific tasks with isolated memory and automated context aggregation.
• 🎯 Agent Skills - Modular skill system for specialized domain knowledge and task-specific instructions.
• ⚡ Special Commands - Create custom command agents from CONTENT.md files in ~/.kader/commands

Installation

Prerequisites

• Python 3.11 or higher
• Ollama (optional, for local LLMs)
• uv package manager (recommended) or pip

Using uv (recommended)

# Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/your-repo/kader.git
cd kader

# Install dependencies with uv
uv sync

# Run the CLI
uv run python -m cli

Using uv tool

With uv tool, you can install Kader globally and run it directly with the kader command:

# Install Kader globally using uv tool
uv tool install kader

# Run the CLI
kader

Using pip

# Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/your-repo/kader.git
cd kader

# Install in development mode
pip install -e .

# Run the CLI
python -m cli

Quick Start

Running the CLI

# Run the Kader CLI using uv
uv run python -m cli

# Or using pip
python -m cli

First Steps in CLI

Once the CLI is running:

1. Type any question to start chatting with the agent.
2. Use /help to see available commands.
3. Use /models to check and interactively switch available models.
4. Run terminal commands directly by prefixing with ! (e.g. !ls -la).

Configuration

When the kader module is imported for the first time, it automatically creates a .kader directory in your home directory and a .env file.

Environment Variables

The application automatically loads environment variables from ~/.kader/.env:

• OLLAMA_API_KEY: API key for Ollama Cloud (for cloud models at ollama.com). Get your key from https://ollama.com/settings
• GOOGLE_API_KEY: API key for Google Gemini (required for Google Provider).
• ANTHROPIC_API_KEY: API key for Anthropic Claude (required for Anthropic Provider).
• Additional variables can be added to the .env file and will be automatically loaded.

Memory and Sessions

Kader stores data in ~/.kader/:

• Sessions: ~/.kader/memory/sessions/
• Configuration: ~/.kader/
• Memory files: ~/.kader/memory/
• Checkpoints: ~/.kader/memory/sessions/<session-id>/executors/ (Aggregated context from sub-agents)

CLI Commands

Command	Description
/help	Show command reference
/models	Show available models (Ollama local & cloud, Google & Anthropic)
/clear	Clear conversation
/save	Save current session
/load <id>	Load a saved session
/sessions	List saved sessions
/skills	List loaded skills
/commands	List special commands
/cost	Show usage costs
/init	Initialize .kader directory with KADER.md
/exit	Exit the CLI
!cmd	Run terminal command

Keyboard Shortcuts

Shortcut	Action
Ctrl+C	Cancel current operation
Ctrl+D	Exit the CLI

Project Structure

kader/
├── cli/                    # Interactive command-line interface
│   ├── app.py             # Main application entry point (Rich + prompt_toolkit)
│   ├── utils.py           # Constants and helpers
│   ├── llm_factory.py     # Provider selection logic
│   ├── __init__.py        # Package exports
│   └── commands/          # CLI command handlers
│       ├── base.py        # Base command class
│       └── initialize.py  # /init command
│   └── README.md          # CLI documentation
├── examples/              # Example implementations
│   ├── memory_example.py  # Memory management examples
│   ├── google_example.py  # Google Gemini provider examples
│   ├── anthropic_example.py # Anthropic Claude provider examples
│   ├── planner_executor_example.py # Advanced workflow examples
│   ├── skills/           # Agent skills examples
│   │   ├── hello/        # Greeting skill with instructions
│   │   ├── calculator/   # Math calculation skill
│   │   └── react_agent.py # Skills demo with ReAct agent
│   └── README.md         # Examples documentation
├── kader/                # Core framework
│   ├── agent/            # Agent implementations (Planning, ReAct)
│   ├── memory/           # Memory management & persistence
│   ├── providers/        # LLM providers (Ollama, Google, Anthropic)
│   ├── tools/            # Tools (File System, Web, Command, AgentTool)
│   ├── prompts/          # Prompt templates (Jinja2)
│   └── utils/            # Utilities (Checkpointer, ContextAggregator)
├── pyproject.toml        # Project dependencies
├── README.md             # This file
└── uv.lock               # Dependency lock file

Core Components

Agents

Kader provides a robust agent architecture:

• ReActAgent: Reasoning and Acting agent that combines thoughts with actions.
• PlanningAgent: High-level agent that breaks complex tasks into manageable plans.
• BaseAgent: Abstract base class for creating custom agent behaviors.

LLM Providers

Kader supports multiple backends:

• OllamaProvider: Connects to locally running Ollama instances.
• OllamaProvider (Cloud): Connects to cloud models at ollama.com (requires OLLAMA_API_KEY).
• GoogleProvider: High-performance access to Gemini models.
• AnthropicProvider: Full support for Claude models.

Agent-As-Tool (AgentTool)

The AgentTool allows a PlanningAgent (Architect) to delegate work to a ReActAgent (Worker). It features:

• Persistent Memory: Sub-agent conversations are saved to JSON.
• Context Aggregation: Sub-agent research and actions are automatically merged into the main session's checkpoint.md via ContextAggregator.

Agent Skills

Kader supports a modular skill system for domain-specific knowledge and specialized instructions:

• Skill Structure: Skills are defined as directories containing SKILL.md files with YAML frontmatter
• Skill Loading: Skills are loaded from ~/.kader/skills (high priority) and ./.kader/ directories
• Skill Injection: Available skills are automatically injected into the system prompt
• Skills Tool: Agents can load skills dynamically using the skills_tool

Special Commands

Kader supports special commands — custom command agents that can be invoked from the CLI:

• Command Structure: Commands are defined as directories containing CONTENT.md files
• Command Loading: Commands are loaded from ./.kader/commands/ (higher priority) and ~/.kader/commands/
• Command Invocation: Use /<command-name> <task> to execute a command
• Memory Persistence: Command executions are saved to ~/.kader/memory/sessions/<session-id>/executors/<command-name>-<uuid>/conversation.json

Creating a Special Command

Create a command directory with a CONTENT.md file:

~/.kader/commands/mycommand/
├── CONTENT.md          # Required - command instructions
├── templates/          # Optional - templates, scripts
└── assets/            # Optional - files

CONTENT.md format:

---
description: What this command does
---

# Command Instructions

Your command agent instructions here...

## Guidelines
- Guideline 1
- Guideline 2

Example: Lint and Test Command

~/.kader/commands/lint-test/
└── CONTENT.md

---
description: Lint and test the codebase
---

You are a Lint and Test Agent. Run linting and tests when requested.

## Instructions

1. Run: uv run ruff check .
2. Run: uv run ruff format --check .
3. Run: uv run pytest -v
4. Report results

Usage:

/lint-test
/lint-test run full check

Use /commands to list all available special commands.

File System Tools with Gitignore Filtering

The file system tools (read_directory, grep, glob) automatically filter out files and directories that match patterns defined in .gitignore files.

You can disable this filtering by passing apply_gitignore_filter=False when creating tools:

from pathlib import Path
from kader.tools.filesys import get_filesystem_tools

# With filtering (default)
tools = get_filesystem_tools(base_path=Path.cwd())

# Without filtering
tools = get_filesystem_tools(base_path=Path.cwd(), apply_gitignore_filter=False)

Example skill structure:

~/.kader/skills/hello/
├── SKILL.md
└── scripts/
    └── hello.py

Example skill (SKILL.md):

---
name: hello
description: Skill for ALL greeting requests
---

# Hello Skill

This skill provides the greeting format you must follow.

## How to greet

Always greet the user with:
- A warm welcome
- Their name if mentioned
- A friendly emoji

Memory Management

• SlidingWindowConversationManager: Maintains context within token limits.
• PersistentSlidingWindowConversationManager: Auto-saves sub-agent history.
• Checkpointer: Generates markdown summaries of agent actions.

Development

Setting up for Development

# Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/your-repo/kader.git
cd kader

# Install in development mode with uv
uv sync

# Run the CLI
uv run python -m cli

Running Tests

# Run tests with uv
uv run pytest

# Run tests with specific options
uv run pytest --verbose

Code Quality

Kader uses various tools for maintaining code quality:

# Run linter
uv run ruff check .

# Format code
uv run ruff format .

Troubleshooting

Common Issues

• No models found: Ensure your providers are correctly configured. For Ollama, run ollama serve. For Google, ensure GOOGLE_API_KEY is set. For Anthropic, ensure ANTHROPIC_API_KEY is set.
• Connection errors: Verify internet access for cloud providers and local service availability for Ollama.

Contributing

We welcome contributions! Please see CONTRIBUTING.md for detailed guidelines on:

• Setting up your development environment
• Code style guidelines
• Running tests
• Submitting pull requests

Quick Start for Contributors

# Fork and clone
git clone https://github.com/your-username/kader.git
cd kader

# Install dependencies
uv sync

# Run tests
uv run pytest

# Run linter
uv run ruff check .

Coding with AI

This project includes a specialized skill for AI coding agents. When working with AI assistants on this codebase, they should use the contributing-to-kader skill located in .kader/skills/contributing-to-kader. This skill provides AI agents with essential guidelines including:

• Core development rules (linting, formatting, testing)
• Key commands for development workflow
• Project structure overview
• Best practices for contributing

AI assistants can load this skill using the skills_tool to get specialized instructions for working with this project.

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License - see the LICENSE file for details.

Acknowledgments

• Built with Rich and prompt_toolkit for the beautiful CLI interface.
• Uses Ollama for local LLM execution.
• Powered by Google Gemini for advanced cloud-based reasoning.
• Enhanced by Anthropic Claude for high-quality coding assistance.