The shell, past the pipe

Structure all the way down.

A shell where values stay typed, tools resolve reproducibly, capabilities are explicit, and agents never have to scrape a wall of terminal text.

typed valuesreal PTYsstructured protocol

shoal · interactive live

~ main › ["ada", "grace", "linus"]

.where(.len() > 3).map(.upper())

["GRACE", "LINUS"]

~ main › 1.5gb + 500mb

2gb size

~ main › git status

statepathmodifiedsite/templates/base.htmlnewsite/content/docs/

~ main ›

ordinary commandsstructured results

Past the text stream

The terminal deserves a richer physics.

Unix made programs composable by agreeing on bytes. Shoal keeps the composition, then gives data its shape back.

The old currentThe Shoal current

01Structure guessed at every boundaryTyped values cross the boundary intact

02A flat, mutable PATHScoped, locked tool resolution with reef

03Permissions inherited from ambient stateSemantic capabilities made explicit

04Agents scrape the same terminal wallRefs, shapes, and events over a protocol

What Shoal connects

Filter, map, match, and transform values without flattening them into text.

Run external commands with real PTYs, foreground jobs, suspension, and history.

Keep status, output, diagnostics, and command-specific structure together.

Resolve tools through explicit scopes and record the exact locked executable.

Inspect plans, approvals, journal entries, undo data, and semantic authority.

Give humans and agents the same typed refs, session state, tasks, and events.

Manual

Quickstart, language, shell, tools, agents, and protocol workflows.

Architecture

System map, crate ownership, execution paths, protocols, and security.

Ready to try Shoal?The Quickstart gets you to a working prompt.