Terminal Mode

Terminal mode is the primary interface for local use. Launch it by running nimbus with no arguments from inside a git repository.

Launch

cd ~/your-project
nimbus

The welcome screen

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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

First launch: indexing

The first time you launch Nimbus in a repository, it indexes all source files:

• Embeds code using Voyage AI voyage-code-2
• Builds a BM25 keyword index
• Stores everything in ChromaDB at ~/.nimbus/chroma/

This typically takes 30–120 seconds. Subsequent launches are instant — Nimbus tracks file modification times and only re-embeds changed files.

The REPL loop

After indexing, you're at the nimbus › prompt. This is a full readline REPL:

• Command history — 500 entries, navigable with arrow keys
• Tab completion — available where readline supports it
• Multi-line input — not supported; keep tasks on one line

Anything you type that isn't a built-in command is treated as a task description and sent through the full pipeline.

Session persistence

Every task session is automatically recorded to ~/.nimbus/sessions/. You can replay any session with nimbus replay. See Replay for details.

Available commands

Command	Description
<task>	Run a task
status	Show repo and index info
undo	Revert the last task's commit
explain <file>	Explain a file
explain <file>:<start>-<end>	Explain a line range
help	List commands
quit / exit / q	Exit