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The terminal provider works with no credentials and no required config.

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How it works

terminal.config() spawns the standalone tuichat binary as a subprocess and drives it over JSON-RPC. The binary auto-downloads from GitHub Releases the first time you run it. In a TTY it boots the rich UI. In a non-TTY context, such as CI or piped input, it falls back to a synchronous readline loop, so the same agent code works for scripted integration tests. 
import { Spectrum } from "spectrum-ts";
import { terminal } from "spectrum-ts/providers/terminal";

const app = await Spectrum({
  providers: [terminal.config()],
});

for await (const [space, message] of app.messages) {
  if (message.content.type === "text") {
    await space.send(`echo: ${message.content.text}`);
  }
}
No credentials, no config. Import and run.

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Config

terminal.config({
  commands: [
    { name: "/clear", description: "Clear conversation memory" },
    { name: "/whoami", description: "Print sender details" },
  ],
});
OptionTypeDefaultDescription
commands{ name: string; description?: string }[][]Slash commands surfaced in the TUI’s command picker. Names must match /^\/[A-Za-z0-9_-]+$/.
Slash commands arrive as regular text messages with the command string as the content. Handle them in your for await loop the same way you’d handle any text.

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Working with multiple spaces

By default the TUI starts on chat-1. New chats opened with Ctrl+N get chat-2, chat-3, and so on. To open a named space programmatically, pass an id: 
import { terminal } from "spectrum-ts/providers/terminal";

const t = terminal(app);
const debug = await t.space.get("debug");
await debug.send("agent online");
Calling space.get() ensures the chat exists in the sidebar. This is useful for kicking off a conversation before any user input.

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When to use it

  • Iterating on agent logic: every Spectrum API works exactly as it would in production, so behavior you build here ships unchanged.
  • Integration tests: pipe stdin in non-TTY mode and assert on stdout. CI does not need a TUI.
  • CLI tools: use the same handler shape as any multi-platform deployment, with reactions and replies as first-class events.