Formic

Formic — AI-powered task manager that turns goals into shipped code. Orchestrates Claude Code, Copilot CLI, and OpenCode with structured planning, parallel execution, and human review. 🐜
📺 Watch the demo video if the player above doesn't load.

Why Formic?

AI coding agents are powerful but chaotic. Without structure, they skip planning, overwrite each other's files, and lose context mid-task. Formic adds a tech-lead layer — every task goes through briefing, planning, and review before code ships.

- 🏗️ Structured pipeline — Brief → Plan → Declare → Execute → Review
- 🔀 Parallel execution — multiple agents work simultaneously with file-lease concurrency
- 🎯 Goal decomposition — describe a high-level objective, the architect AI breaks it into subtasks
- 🛡️ Crash-resilient — atomic saves, rolling backups, auto-recovery from corruption
- 🖥️ 100% local — your code never leaves your machine

Requirements

- Node.js 20+ and npm
- A supported AI agent CLI:
  - Claude Code CLI — npm install -g @anthropic-ai/claude-code
  - GitHub Copilot CLI — gh extension install github/gh-copilot
  - OpenCode CLI — npm install -g opencode-ai

Getting Started

1. Install — npm install -g @rickywo/formic

2. Start the server — Run PORT=8000 formic start, then open http://localhost:8000.

3. Add a workspace — Open the workspace selector in the top-left and point it at your project repo directory.

Supported Agents

Formic supports three AI agent backends. Switch between them from the Kanban header via the provider dropdown — no server restart needed. The dropdown shows which CLIs are installed and their versions.

Precedence: UI selection > AGENT_TYPE env var > claude (default). The env var acts as a headless/startup fallback.

OpenCode notes:
- Install: npm install -g opencode-ai
-…