Configure Raw

Configure Raw

Edit or diagnose settings; preserve unrelated fields. Creation skills cover new assets.

File and selection

File: $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/raw/config.json or ~/.config/raw/config.json; --config selects another. Strict JSON: no unknown/duplicate fields, comments or trailing commas. raw config init creates once.

Root: models, agents; optional default_agent, mcp, sessions, ui, vars, var_providers. Agent precedence: --agent NAME, RAW_AGENT, default_agent. Prompt precedence: --system-prompt, RAW_SYSTEM_PROMPT, agent prompt, built-in prompt. No --model; agents reference model aliases.

Read references/packages.md for bindings and references/dashboard.md for web editing.

Model: models.<alias>

Required strings: provider (service name), method, exact upstream model_id. Methods: openai-chat-completions, openai-responses, anthropic-messages, google-generate-content.

• base_url: HTTP(S); required except matching official OpenAI/Anthropic/Google, Ollama chat (http://127.0.0.1:11434/v1), OpenRouter chat (https://openrouter.ai/api/v1).
• api_key: nonempty literal OR api_key_env: environment identifier, never both. Default env keys: OpenAI OPENAI_API_KEY, Anthropic ANTHROPIC_API_KEY, Google GEMINI_API_KEY then GOOGLE_API_KEY, OpenRouter OPENROUTER_API_KEY. Selected model alone resolves credentials; other providers have no default.
• vision: boolean, default false; required for builtin/view_image.
• context_window_tokens, max_output_tokens: positive integers; output below context. Verify limits.

Agent: agents.<name>

Required model: existing alias; tools.use: ordered unique exact IDs (empty allowed): builtin/<id>, local/<id>, agent/<id>, mcp/<server>/<original-name>. No wildcards. builtin=package, local=global Raw folders, agent=config-adjacent folders. Shell tools: builtin/bash, or builtin/powershell (same arguments) on Windows without Git Bash.

Optional:

• system_prompt: string, empty allowed, OR system_prompt_file: nonempty UTF-8 path relative to config or absolute. Never both.
• skills.use: unique builtin/local/agent IDs. Nonempty requires both builtin/list_skills and builtin/load_skill.
• hooks.use: ordered unique exact string IDs: local/<name>, agent/<name> or pkg/<alias>/hooks/<export>; empty/omitted means none. The folder has hook.json and owned scripts. Read references/hooks.md for every field and value type; create_hook covers authoring and tests.
• vars: ordered unique existing root variable names; omitted means none. Add builtin/list_vars/builtin/read_var to tools.use for discovery/reading.
• Positive integers max_steps (10000), max_output_bytes (65536), request_timeout_ms (600000, the longest a model stream may stay silent). Precedence: flags, RAW_* env, agent.
• tools.rules: ordered {match:string,effect:"allow"|"ask"|"deny"}. Match canonical IDs/globs (*, ?); last matching rule wins; unmatched runs automatically. Only ask permits when:{any:string,regex:string}, a schema-bound string, number or boolean path and RE2 search. Bash uses command; run_in_background matches true. -y cannot bypass ask; no approval channel fails closed. Not a shell parser/sandbox.

request.max_output_tokens: positive, within model/context reserve. Other fields only for matching pairs:

Hook manifest and response fields are specified in references/hooks.md. Gate failures block; notification failures warn. Hook approval never overrides a tool rule.

Verify upstream support. cache: mode auto/no-hints, optional nonempty key (OpenAI), retention (OpenAI/Anthropic), backend generic/llama.cpp (latter requires chat). compact: nonnegative keep_recent_turns (2, a lower bound when it fits), positive keep_recent_tokens (verbatim tail size, min(20000, a quarter of the input budget)), positive max_output_tokens (16384, lowered to the model output cap and a quarter of the context), compact.trigger_tokens: positive threshold with context metadata/output reserve, false for manual only; default is 80% of the input budget when the model declares context_window_tokens. compact.clear_tokens: positive threshold for clearing old tool results to saved copies before compacting, false to turn it off; requires context_window_tokens, default 60% of the input budget. compact.instructions: optional string (at most 16384 characters) appended to every checkpoint prompt, e.g. what the checkpoint must always keep. compact.strategy: "checkpoint" (default) or "native", opt-in provider compaction on Anthropic Messages and OpenAI Responses only, falling back to a checkpoint with a warning.

Variables and providers

vars.<name> requires nonempty description, access:"read"|"use", and source. Read allows read/consume; use only consume. Optional type: string/number/boolean/object/array/null/json. Optional cache_ttl_ms: integer 0..2147483647 (default 0). Names: [a-z][a-z0-9_.-]{0,63}; constructor/prototype reserved.

Source shapes:

• {kind:"literal",value:JSON}: type inferred, including false/0/empty/null.
• {kind:"env",name:"ENV_NAME"}: string; unset errors, empty works.
• {kind:"file",path:"data.json",format:"json"}: config-relative/absolute. text(default) preserves whitespace; json parses. UTF-8, <=65536 bytes.
• {kind:"provider",name:"provider_name",params:{}}: params: config-defined object. No recursive refs. Built-in system.time requires empty params, returns UTC ISO time.

Type defaults: env/text/time string, literal inferred, others json. Env consumption accepts string/finite number/boolean, rejecting NUL.

var_providers.<name> requires string command; optional args: string array ([]), cwd: config-relative/absolute path (config directory), timeout_ms: integer 1..2147483647 (5000), max_output_bytes: integer 1..1048576 (65536, combined stdout/stderr). system.time is reserved. Bare commands use PATH; command paths resolve from config. Args stay literal and run from provider cwd. No shell/template expansion; process inherits environment.

Providers receive {protocol_version:1,name,params} on stdin, return {value,observed_at?} JSON on stdout, exit 0. Errors fail without stale fallback.

raw [--config PATH] [--agent NAME] vars list|get NAME needs no model/MCP/session. List is metadata; get requires read access. Bash env_refs passes named vars as environment values.

Values cache per runtime; resume starts empty. Vars changes preserve the prefix/key.

UI, MCP and sessions

Root ui: density compact/normal/verbose; reasoning hidden/summary/full; color auto/always/never; icons auto/unicode/ascii; theme terminal/dark/light. Matching flags override config. Show thinking with "ui":{"reasoning":"full"}.

mcp.servers.<name>: stdio {transport:"stdio",command:string,args?:string[],env?:string-map,timeout_ms?} or remote {transport:"streamable-http",url:HTTP(S),headers?:string-map,timeout_ms?}. timeout_ms (1..2147483647, default the agent request_timeout_ms) bounds connect, discovery and each call; progress notifications restart it. Env/headers stay literal. Activate by exact tools.use IDs.

Canonical-only sessions.retention_days: positive integer, default 30. Resume uses current config/agent on the same ID. Meaningful changes rotate once; unchanged resumes stabilize. Old stores cannot block new work.

Edit and verify

Back up, keep mode 0600, validate before replacing. Portable candidate: raw --config candidate.json config list. Canonical candidate with sessions:

shCopy code
set -eu
stage=$(mktemp -d)
trap 'rm -rf "$stage"' EXIT
mkdir "$stage/raw"
cp "$1" "$stage/raw/config.json"
XDG_CONFIG_HOME="$stage" raw --config "$stage/raw/config.json" config list

Test changes.

Complete example

Replace model ID.

jsonCopy code
{"default_agent":"raw","models":{"local":{"provider":"ollama","method":"openai-chat-completions","model_id":"YOUR_INSTALLED_MODEL","context_window_tokens":32768}},"vars":{"now":{"description":"Current UTC time","access":"read","source":{"kind":"provider","name":"system.time"}}},"agents":{"raw":{"model":"local","vars":["now"],"tools":{"use":["builtin/read_file","builtin/bash","builtin/list_vars","builtin/read_var"]},"hooks":{"use":["agent/guard"]},"compact":{"trigger_tokens":24000}}}}