Skip to content

ROADMAP.md

Latest commit

 

History

History
149 lines (106 loc) · 6.98 KB

ROADMAP.md

File metadata and controls

149 lines (106 loc) · 6.98 KB

Roadmap

Terax direction, what's shipped, what's coming, and what's deliberately out of scope.

This file is updated as direction evolves. For day-to-day work, see GitHub Issues and the Projects board.

What Terax is

Terax is a fast, lightweight, AI-native terminal (ADE - agentic development environment). It pairs a native PTY backend with a modern UI: multi-tab terminals, an integrated code editor, a file explorer, source control, and a first-class AI agent system that works with your own API keys or fully local models. Under 10 MB on disk. No telemetry. Keys stored in the OS keychain.

The product is opinionated: terminal-first, AI as a primitive (not a sidebar), lightweight always, cross-platform without compromise.

What Terax is not

  • Not a full IDE replacement. Heavy IDE features that overlap with VS Code / Cursor / Zed are out of scope.
  • Not a browser. Web preview exists for local dev servers and lightweight doc viewing only.
  • Not a general workspace. Tools and formats that pull the product away from the terminal-first surface are out of scope.
  • Not a one-size-fits-all CLI replacement. The goal is "best AI-native terminal", not "shell with extras".

Themes

The themes below frame every scope decision.

  1. AI as a native primitive. Agents, tools, autocomplete, voice - first-class, not a panel bolted onto a regular terminal.
  2. Lightweight always. 7-8 MB binary. Every dependency justified. Per-tab memory budget enforced.
  3. Terminal-first. xterm.js correctness, PTY fidelity, TUI app compatibility are non-negotiable.
  4. Cross-platform parity. macOS, Linux, Windows, WSL. No platform-specific exclusives.
  5. Security by default. Path guards, SSRF protection, OSC trust, IPC sandboxing. Defaults safe out of the box.

Shipped

Terminal

  • Multi-tab terminal with WebGL renderer
  • Native PTY backend (zsh, bash, pwsh, fish, cmd)
  • Split panes
  • Shell integration (cwd, prompt markers)
  • Inline search, link detection, true-color
  • Private terminal tabs with AI-context redaction
  • WSL bridge as workspace environment

Editor

  • Multi-language support (TypeScript / JavaScript, Rust, Python, HTML / CSS, JSON, Markdown, Go, C / C++ / Java / C#, PHP)
  • Inline AI autocomplete
  • AI edit diffs
  • Vim mode
  • Prebuilt themes

File Explorer

  • Icon theme with full file-type coverage
  • Fuzzy search, keyboard navigation, inline rename, context actions

Git / Source Control

  • Source control panel (stage, commit, branch)
  • Git history with commit graph
  • Per-file diffs

AI

  • Multiple cloud and local providers (BYOK)
  • Multi-agent and sub-agents
  • Voice input
  • Slash commands and skills
  • Project memory and per-project configuration
  • Tools with approval flow (file read / write / edit, bash, search, plan)
  • Workspace file picker
  • Auto-compact for long context

Web Preview

  • Auto-detected local dev server preview
  • Image and PDF viewers
  • Sandboxed iframe

Platform Integration

  • macOS, Linux (.deb / .rpm / AppImage), Windows (NSIS), WSL
  • AUR (Arch)
  • Windows Explorer context-menu integration
  • Auto-updater
  • OS keychain for API keys
  • No telemetry

Security

  • Hardened AI tool surface (file system, network, IPC)
  • SSRF and DNS rebinding defenses on outbound HTTP
  • Trust gating in terminal escape-sequence handling
  • Sandboxed preview surface

Planned

Coming next

  • SSH support (PTY auth and known_hosts first; SFTP and port forwarding later)
  • Inline terminal auto-suggestions (history-based first; AI-powered opt-in later)
  • Themes and customizations (terminal themes, UI accents, keybindings, layout)
  • AI autocomplete improvements in editor (project-aware context, lower latency)
  • Drag and drop in terminal (files as quoted paths, AI panel as context)
  • AI agent meta-orchestration (Terax agent spawning and managing external coding agents like Claude Code / OpenCode)
  • More slash commands and skills
  • Approval flow improvements (YOLO / auto-approve, project-scoped policies, per-tool trust)
  • Persistent terminal sessions and layout restore
  • Preview surface expansion (better image / Markdown handling)
  • Test coverage expansion (PTY edge cases, security functions, AI tool guards)

Longer horizon

  • Release automation (CHANGELOG, version bump, tag flow)
  • Bundle optimization (lazy-load language packs, individual UI primitive imports, tree-shake)
  • Selective TS → Rust migration where the profiler shows measurable wins
  • AI tools / skills as installable bundles
  • Live filesystem updates in explorer and editor

Wanted contributions

Strategic areas where help is welcome. Pick something and propose an approach in Discord or via an issue first.

  • Test coverage. PTY edge cases across platforms, security functions, AI tool guards.
  • Bundle optimization. Profile and propose specific dependency replacements or tree-shake fixes.
  • Platform-specific bugs. Rendering issues on niche distros, shell quirks, WSL edge cases.
  • Documentation and translations. Improvements, screenshots, examples, non-English README sections.
  • Themes. Terminal and editor themes, UI accent palettes that fit the lightweight aesthetic.
  • Provider integrations. Only providers that add unique value beyond existing coverage. Justify the case before implementing.

See good-first-issue and help-wanted labels on GitHub Issues for concrete tasks.

Out of scope

Categories that will not be built into Terax. Individual feature requests in these categories will be closed.

  • Heavy IDE features. Full language-server integration, integrated debuggers, refactoring engines, project-wide search at IDE scale. Use a real editor for those.
  • Notebook and document workspaces. Anything that turns Terax into a document host rather than a terminal.
  • Package manager and toolchain UIs. Use npm, pip, cargo and friends in the terminal directly.
  • Full web browser features. Preview pane stays scoped to local dev servers and lightweight doc viewing. No navigation history, no bookmarks, no dev tools.
  • Telemetry, analytics, accounts. Terax stays BYOK and offline-respectful.
  • Extension marketplaces at IDE scale. Narrowly-scoped AI tool / skill bundles may happen eventually. Arbitrary UI or behavior extensions will not.
  • Third-party subscription session bridges. Forwarding cloud subscription auth (provider-managed login sessions) through Terax is not technically feasible for third-party clients.

Decision authority

Direction and scope decisions are made by @crynta. Trusted reviewers (informal, no fixed roles yet) provide input on security, performance, and platform-specific areas.

If a PR is closed and you disagree, raise it in Discord. Happy to discuss, not happy to be ambushed in a PR comment thread.

This will likely formalize over time as the project grows.