tCode
tCode is a terminal-based coding agent powered by tAI. It reads, writes, and edits files in your own projects, runs shell commands, searches your codebase and the web, and pulls in context from Gmail, Notion, GitHub, and Linear, all from a chat-style REPL you keep open next to your editor.
- Why tCode exists as a separate surface from tAI in the browser
- The core idea behind how it decides what to do
- Nothing happens invisibly, the approval model in one paragraph
- What this documentation covers and where to start
- tCode compared with tAI in the browser
- Where your data goes while a session is running
- Built by the same team as tAI
New to tCode? Start with Quickstart. To give tCode standing instructions about a specific project, see tcode.md.
Why tCode exists
Most people's first experience with tAI is the browser: you describe a problem, tAI writes code, and you copy it into your editor by hand.
The core idea
tCode is given a small set of tools, reading a file, editing one, running a command, searching, and it decides for itself, turn by turn, which of them to use to get your request done.
Nothing happens invisibly
Anything that only reads, a file, a search, the web, runs immediately, since there is nothing to lose from that.
What this documentation covers
This documentation covers tCode end to end: installing it, how the tool-use loop actually works, every slash command it supports, the connector system for pulling in context from your other tools, remote control from the tAI web app, configuration, and the security model behind all of it.
tCode compared with tAI in the browser
tCode is not a replacement for tAI in the browser, it is another way to reach the same account and the same models, chosen for a different kind of task.
Where your data goes
Everything tCode does with your project happens locally, on the machine you run it on.
Built by the same team as tAI
tAI itself, the models underneath tCode, is developed by Artfical, the same team responsible for tCode itself, so the two are built together rather than one being a third-party client of the other.