35 lines
1.7 KiB
Markdown
35 lines
1.7 KiB
Markdown
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# Design Philosophy
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Pi has a very specific philosophy that explains almost every architectural decision:
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### "Extend, don't fork"
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Other coding agents bake features in. If you want sub-agents, plan mode, permission gates, or custom tools, you either use what they built or you fork the project. Pi takes the opposite approach: the core is deliberately minimal, and everything beyond the basics is built through the extension system.
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### What Pi ships without (on purpose)
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| Feature | Pi's approach |
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|---------|--------------|
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| Sub-agents | Build with extensions, or install a package |
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| Plan mode | Build with extensions, or install a package |
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| Permission popups | Build with extensions — design your own security model |
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| MCP support | Build with extensions — or use Skills instead |
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| Background bash | Use tmux — full observability, direct interaction |
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| Built-in todos | They confuse models. Use a TODO.md, or build with extensions |
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This isn't missing features — it's a deliberate architectural choice. Every baked-in feature is an opinion that might not match your workflow. Pi gives you the primitives to build exactly what you need.
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### The extension system as a first-class citizen
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Extensions aren't an afterthought. The entire event system, tool registration, command system, custom UI, and session persistence were designed from the ground up to make extensions as powerful as built-in features. An extension can:
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- Override any built-in tool
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- Replace the system prompt
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- Modify every message sent to the LLM
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- Replace the input editor entirely
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- Register new model providers
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- Control the agent's tool set at runtime
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This is the core value proposition: **pi is a platform, not just a tool.**
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---
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