The open source terminal for running many coding agents at once and always knowing which one needs you. Native macOS on Ghostty, native Windows on WinUI.
Run many coding agents in parallel and always know which one needs you.
The features below describe the macOS app. A native Windows frontend using WinUI 3 is in development, with shared core behavior and platform-native UI. See Windows support and the Windows testing guide.
- Agent status, always visible. Every workspace shows working, blocked, or idle. Claude Code, Codex, and OpenCode report it directly; agents without hooks (Gemini CLI, Copilot CLI, Cursor Agent, Aider) get it from reading the terminal screen against patterns you can override in
~/.config/programa/agent-detection/. - Notifications built for agents. A waiting agent's pane gets a ring, its tab lights up, and ⌘⇧U jumps to the latest unread.
- Vertical workspace sidebar. Git branch, PR status, working directory, listening ports, and the latest notification for every workspace, at a glance.
- Diff review panel. Split a review panel beside an agent's terminal, comment on the diff, and send the comments straight into the agent's input. It refreshes itself when the agent goes idle.
- Git worktrees as workspaces.
programa worktree create <branch>checks out a worktree and opens it as its own workspace, badged under its parent repo. - Race agents against each other.
programa race "<prompt>"fans one prompt across N agents (Claude Code, OpenCode, or Codex), each in its own isolated worktree/workspace, so you can compare approaches and merge the one you like. - In-app browser. Split a scriptable browser next to your terminal; agents can snapshot the page, click, fill forms, and evaluate JS against your dev server.
- Native and fast. Swift/AppKit with libghostty rendering, no Electron. Reads your existing
~/.config/ghostty/configfor themes, fonts, and colors.
More: named layouts (programa layout save/apply), a markdown viewer panel, instant agent splits (⌘D / ⌘⇧D, ⌘⇧C for Claude Code), the command palette (⌘⇧P), and a CLI plus Unix-socket JSON-RPC API scriptable end to end.
or
brew tap darkroomengineering/programa
brew install --cask programaThe macOS app auto-updates. Every eligible commit on main that passes CI and
both platform release builds advances the shared rolling release, which
provides programa-macos.dmg and programa-windows.exe from the same commit.
If either platform fails, the previous rolling release remains available.
On macOS, relaunch restores layout, directories, scrollback, and browser state.
Terminal processes survive Programa quitting or crashing, and the app
reattaches to them live on the next launch.
The Windows frontend uses WinUI 3 controls. macOS retains its AppKit/SwiftUI interface. Workspace, tab, split, and session behavior belongs in the shared core; each frontend handles its platform's rendering, input, window management, and accessibility.
The planned Windows download is programa-windows.exe on the same
rolling release
as programa-macos.dmg. The WinUI frontend builds and passes its automated
checks on Windows; a verification build
is available from GitHub Actions. It is not yet a published release. Desktop
interaction testing and macOS feature parity remain incomplete.
On an Apple Silicon Mac, test the Windows executable in a Windows 11 Arm VM; Windows can run x64 executables through emulation. See the local setup and interaction checks.
tmux multiplexes shells inside any terminal and keeps them alive when you disconnect. It knows nothing about what runs in them. With six agents in six panes, every one looks the same until you click through. There is no notification, no sidebar, no browser, no diff, and the whole UI is keyboard chords inside a text grid.
Programa keeps what tmux is good at and adds what agents need:
| tmux | Programa | |
|---|---|---|
| Sessions survive the app quitting or crashing | yes, detach and reattach | yes, on macOS: terminal processes keep running and the app reattaches live on relaunch |
| Which agent needs me | no | working, blocked, or idle per workspace; a ring on the pane, a lit tab, ⌘⇧U to the latest unread |
| Git branch, PR, ports, working directory per session | no | in the sidebar, always |
| Review an agent's diff and send comments back to it | no | built-in review panel |
| Browser the agent can drive | no | split a scriptable browser next to the terminal |
| Scriptable from outside | tmux commands | a CLI, a Unix-socket JSON-RPC API with a published contract, and an MCP server |
| Rendering | your terminal | native Metal via libghostty on macOS, WinUI on Windows, no Electron |
| Works over SSH to a remote box | yes | not today; a headless core is in progress so a remote machine can host sessions |
cmux is where Programa started: a GPL fork of Manaflow's cmux, the same idea of a native Ghostty-based macOS terminal with vertical tabs and agent notifications. Programa has since gone its own way, narrowing the app to a fast local terminal and building the agent workflow on top:
- Agent status for agents without hooks (Gemini CLI, Copilot CLI, Cursor Agent, Aider) by reading the terminal screen against overridable patterns, on top of the hook-based reporting for Claude Code, Codex, and OpenCode.
- Normalized agent lifecycle events (turn started, permission requested, input needed, turn completed) over one socket method, so status comes from the agent, not from guessing.
- Live processes survive quit and crash, not just layout and scrollback.
- A diff review panel with line comments that go straight into the agent's input.
- Git worktrees as workspaces, and
programa raceto fan one prompt across several agents in isolated worktrees. - An MCP server and an installable agent skill, so agents can split panes, read sibling output, and coordinate helpers without stealing your focus.
- A machine-readable socket API contract that generates the CLI, the MCP catalog, and the test client, so clients cannot drift.
- Native Windows.
Things cmux has that Programa removed on purpose, to stay lean: SSH remote workspaces and an iOS companion. Both are documented under docs/removed/, with the reasons and what a future version should do differently.
Programa is a terminal, a browser, notifications, workspaces, and a CLI to control all of it: primitives you compose yourself rather than a prescribed workflow. What you build with them is yours.
On macOS, ⌘⇧P opens the command palette, which lists every action. Full reference: docs/keyboard-shortcuts.md. Everything is editable in Settings → Keyboard Shortcuts. Every other preference has a key in ~/.config/programa/settings.json, documented in docs/settings-json.md.
Choose separate light and dark Ghostty themes in Settings → Appearance → Terminal, with matching CLI and settings.json support. See docs/terminal-themes.md.
Agents running inside programa (Claude Code, Codex, OpenCode) can drive the app itself, splitting panes, reading a sibling pane's output, spawning and coordinating a helper agent, all without stealing your focus. programa claude/codex/opencode install-integration installs SKILL.md alongside the existing hooks; see docs/agent-skill.md for the full walkthrough.
The same control surface is also available over MCP, for agents that speak it natively. Point your client at Programa.app/Contents/Resources/bin/programa-mcp; see docs/mcp-server.md. The MCP server also exposes programa's embedded browser as browser_* tools, and programa aside install-mcp registers the Aside browser with Claude Code and Codex for logged-in sites; see docs/aside-browser.md.
darkroom.engineering · Issues · Discussions · @darkroomdevs
GPL-3.0-or-later. Programa began as a GPL fork of cmux by Manaflow, Inc.; modifications © Darkroom Engineering.