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Your First Task

1. Launch Nimbus

Navigate to a git repository and run:

cd ~/your-project
nimbus

On first launch, Nimbus indexes your codebase. You'll see progress as it embeds your files:

  indexing  423 files...
indexing done · 847 chunks embedded

This takes 30–120 seconds. Subsequent launches are instant — only changed files are re-indexed.

2. The welcome screen

Once indexed, you'll see:

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████╗ ██║██║████╗ ████║██╔══██╗██║ ██║██╔════╝
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██║╚██╗██║██║██║╚██╔╝██║██╔══██╗██║ ██║╚════██║
██║ ╚████║██║██║ ╚═╝ ██║██████╔╝╚██████╔╝███████║
╚═╝ ╚═══╝╚═╝╚═╝ ╚═╝╚═════╝ ╚═════╝ ╚══════╝

autonomous software engineering · v1.1.0

repo github.com/acme/api
branch main
indexed 847 files · ready
models opus-4-6 → plan · sonnet-4-6 → impl

help status undo quit

3. Type your first task

At the nimbus › prompt, describe what you want done:

nimbus › add input validation to the user registration endpoint

Be specific. The more context you give, the higher the confidence score.

4. The confidence score

Nimbus retrieves relevant code and shows you a score before proceeding:

  confidence  ████████░░  82%
retrieval 14 relevant chunks found
ambiguity low — task is well-scoped
  • 82% means 14 relevant code chunks were found. Each chunk adds ~3% to the base score of 50%, capped at 95%.
  • Ambiguity is "low" when your task description has 9 or more words.
  • Tasks above your auto_approve_confidence threshold (default 92%) skip the approval prompt automatically.

5. Review and approve the plan

Nimbus generates a file-level change plan using Claude Opus and displays it:

  plan
─────────────────────────────────────
1. api/routes/auth.py add Pydantic model for registration input
2. api/routes/auth.py validate email format and password strength
3. tests/test_auth.py add test for invalid email rejection
4. tests/test_auth.py add test for weak password rejection
─────────────────────────────────────
approve? [y/n/e to edit]
  • y — approve and proceed to implementation
  • n — cancel the task
  • e — open the plan in your configured editor for manual edits

6. Watch live diffs

As Nimbus implements the plan, you see real-time diffs streamed to the terminal:

  api/routes/auth.py
+ from pydantic import BaseModel, EmailStr, validator
+
+ class RegistrationInput(BaseModel):
+ email: EmailStr
+ password: str
+
+ @validator('password')
+ def password_strength(cls, v):
+ if len(v) < 8:
+ raise ValueError('password must be at least 8 characters')
+ return v

7. Approve the commit

After implementation and verification, Nimbus shows the full diff and asks for final approval:

  verification  passed  ·  pytest 47/47

approve diff and commit? [y/n]

Type y to commit locally. In hosted mode, this pushes the branch and opens a PR automatically.

8. Find the PR

In hosted mode, Nimbus prints the PR URL:

  pr  https://github.com/acme/api/pull/142
self-review posted

The PR includes a self-review comment from Nimbus analyzing the changes it made.