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Penguin: A modular, extensible AI coding agent and software engineer with its own execution environment.

Project description

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PyPI version License: AGPL v3 GitHub Actions Documentation Status Downloads

Penguin is an open-source coding agent built on a scalable cognitive architecture runtime.

It is designed for long-running, tool-using, multi-agent software workflows: from interactive coding in the TUI to persistent sessions, subagent delegation, and API-driven automation. Penguin combines a coding-focused agent runtime with durable state, workspace-aware tools, and multiple interfaces on top of the same core.

Why Penguin

  • Purpose-built for software engineering workflows, with coding tools, sessions, and subagents.
  • Stateful runtime: sessions, checkpoints, tool history, and replayable transcripts.
  • Context Window Manager: long sessions stay coherent through category-aware token budgeting, truncation, and replay, preserving recency and message-category priorities across long-running sessions.
  • Multi-agent orchestration: planner/implementer/QA patterns, subagents, and scoped delegation.
  • Multiple surfaces: TUI, CLI, web API, and Python client on the same backend.
  • OpenCode-compatible TUI path: Penguin web/core now powers an OpenCode-style terminal UX.

Quick Start

# Recommended install
pip install "penguin-ai[tui]"

# Set a model provider key (OpenRouter is the easiest starting point)
export OPENROUTER_API_KEY="your_api_key"

# Launch Penguin TUI
penguin

Other entrypoints:

  • penguin - interactive Penguin TUI launcher
  • ptui - direct TUI alias
  • penguin-cli - headless CLI for automation and scripts
  • penguin-web - FastAPI server for web/API usage

What You Get

  • Coding workflow tools: file reads/writes/diffs, shell commands, test execution, search, code analysis, and background process management.
  • Context Window Manager: category-based token budgets, multimodal truncation, and live usage reporting to keep histories within model limits. This supports theoretically infinite sessions.
  • Persistent memory and file-backed context: declarative notes, summary notes, context/ artifacts, docs cache, and daily journal continuity.
  • Multi-agent execution: isolated or shared-context subagents, delegation, planner/ implementer/QA patterns, and background task execution.
  • Browser and research support: web search plus browser automation for documentation, web workflows, and UI testing.
  • Session durability: checkpoints, rollback, branching, transcript replay, and long-running task continuity.
  • Project and task orchestration backed by SQLite, including todo tracking and Run Mode.
  • Native and gateway model support across OpenAI, Anthropic, OpenRouter, and LiteLLM-compatible providers.

Interfaces

Penguin exposes the same runtime through several surfaces:

  • penguin / ptui - terminal-first coding workflow with streaming, tools, and session navigation.
  • penguin-cli - scriptable CLI interface for prompts, tasks, config, and automation.
  • penguin-web - REST + WebSocket/SSE backend for the TUI and custom integrations.
  • Python API - PenguinAgent, PenguinClient, and PenguinAPI for embedding Penguin in code.

Quick Python Example

from penguin import PenguinAgent

with PenguinAgent() as agent:
    response = agent.chat("Summarize the current task charter")
    print(response["assistant_response"])

Installation

Recommended

# Core CLI install
pip install penguin-ai

# Web/API runtime
pip install penguin-ai[web]

# TUI launcher + local web dependencies
pip install "penguin-ai[tui]"

# Full feature set
pip install penguin-ai[all]

Development

git clone https://github.com/Maximooch/penguin.git
cd penguin/penguin
pip install -e .[dev,test]

Extras

Extra Description
[tui] Penguin TUI launcher runtime + local web dependencies
[web] FastAPI server + WebSocket support
[memory_faiss] FAISS vector search + embeddings
[memory_lance] LanceDB vector database
[memory_chroma] ChromaDB integration
[browser] Browser automation (Python 3.11+ only)
[all] Everything above

TUI Runtime

The Penguin TUI launcher supports both development and packaged installs.

  • In a source checkout, penguin prefers local penguin-tui/packages/opencode sources.
  • Outside a source checkout, it bootstraps a cached sidecar binary under ~/.cache/penguin/tui.
  • Stable installs prefer a sidecar that matches the installed Penguin version.
  • You can override the source or binary path when needed:
# Force local source mode
export PENGUIN_OPENCODE_DIR="/path/to/penguin/penguin-tui/packages/opencode"

# Force a specific sidecar binary
export PENGUIN_TUI_BIN_PATH="/path/to/opencode"

You can also override the release endpoint for staging/testing with PENGUIN_TUI_RELEASE_URL.

Common Commands

/models                 # interactive model selector
/model set <MODEL_ID>   # set a specific model
/stream on|off          # toggle streaming
/checkpoint [name]      # save a checkpoint
/checkpoints [limit]    # list checkpoints
/rollback <checkpoint>  # restore a checkpoint
/tokens                 # token usage summary
/run task "Name"       # start a specific task

Architecture

Penguin is structured as a runtime for long-lived agent workflows.

  • PenguinCore coordinates configuration, interfaces, events, and runtime state.
  • Engine runs the reasoning loop, model calls, and tool orchestration.
  • ConversationManager persists sessions, checkpoints, and conversation state.
  • ContextWindowManager manages long-session token budgets with category-aware truncation, multimodal handling, and replay-friendly context continuity.
  • ToolManager and ActionExecutor run workspace-aware tools and action pipelines.
  • CLI, TUI, web, and Python APIs all sit on top of the same backend services.

Penguin's long-term direction is a scalable cognitive architecture runtime: a persistent agent kernel with userland surfaces for sessions, tools, orchestration, and observability.

Read more:

  • architecture.md
  • context/architecture/Penguin_SCAR_80_20_Roadmap.md
  • context/architecture/tui-opencode-implementation.md

Version Highlights

v0.6.1

  • Canonical file editing now centers on read_file, write_file, patch_file, and patch_files.
  • JSON-first edit payloads, generated prompt docs, and centralized compatibility aliases keep parser, tools, and UI metadata aligned.
  • File edit validation, multifile permissions/rollback, overwrite behavior, and diff output consistency are materially more reliable.
  • OpenCode-compatible Penguin TUI flow remains backed by Penguin web/core.

Documentation

Contributing

git clone https://github.com/Maximooch/penguin.git
cd penguin/penguin
pip install -e .[dev,test]
pytest -q

Support

License

Licensing in this repository is split by component:

  • penguin/ and the main Penguin runtime are licensed under the GNU Affero General Public License v3.0 or later.
  • penguin-tui/ contains OpenCode-derived TUI code that remains MIT-licensed; see penguin-tui/LICENSE.
  • Read the official GNU AGPL v3 text

Enterprise licensing without AGPL copyleft requirements is under consideration. If you are interested, contact MaximusPutnam@gmail.com.

Acknowledgments

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