Claw

Desktop UI for Claude Code with local agent execution, Kubernetes management, and 16+ MCP server integrations

Claw is an Electron desktop app that wraps the Claude Code SDK, providing a local-first interface for AI-powered development. Run agents in isolated Git worktrees, manage Kubernetes clusters, integrate with MCP servers, and execute code locally without cloud sync.

Features

🤖 Claude Agent Execution

4 Authentication Methods:

• Claude Pro/Max - Use your Claude subscription (recommended)
• Anthropic API Key - Pay-as-you-go with direct API key
• Custom Model - Configure custom base URL and model name
• AWS Bedrock SSO - Use Claude via Amazon Bedrock with device authorization flow

Agent Capabilities:

• Plan Mode - Read-only analysis with clarifying questions before execution
• Agent Mode - Full code execution with tool permissions
• Background Agents - Run long-running tasks in background using Haiku
• Session Resume - Continue interrupted sessions from where they left off
• Sub-chat System - Multiple parallel conversation tabs per chat
• Model Selection - Choose between Opus, Sonnet (default), or Haiku
• Cross-View Chat Persistence - Chat sessions persist across sidebar tabs and views

AI provider selection: Anthropic Claude (OAuth), AWS Bedrock, and Ollama with per-provider model and context window configuration

🌿 Git Worktree Isolation

Each chat runs in its own Git worktree with an isolated branch:

• Auto-generated branch names (adjective-animal-hash pattern)
• Custom worktree location configuration
• Never touch main branch during agent execution
• Merge branches back when ready with merge dialog
• Git LFS support detection
• Base branch auto-detection (main/master/develop/trunk)

🔍 Visual Diff & Change Management

Built-in Git client with comprehensive change tracking:

• Real-time diff previews (split/unified view modes)
• File staging and commit interface
• PR URL and PR number tracking per chat
• Merge branch dialog for worktree integration
• History view for commits
• Change categorization and filtering

☸️ Kubernetes Management

Multi-cluster EKS integration with real-time monitoring:

• Dashboard - Node metrics, pod status, resource usage charts
• Pod Management - List, inspect, and monitor pods
• Service Management - View and manage Kubernetes services
• Deployment Views - Track deployment status
• Live Log Streaming - Real-time logs with auto-scroll, word wrap, service filtering
• DevSpace Integration - Development environment management

Real-time Kubernetes log streaming with service filtering

🐙 GitHub Integration

Deep GitHub integration for code review and project management:

• PR Review - Browse open pull requests with full diff view
• Issue Tracking - View and chat about issues with agent context
• Code Browser - Navigate repository file tree and view file contents
• Architecture Analysis - Generate Mermaid diagrams from code structure
• Agent Chat - Chat with Claude agents about any PR, issue, or file in context
• README View - Auto-displays repository README when expanding a repo

GitHub PR diff view with full file change context and agent chat panel

Agent analyzing a GitHub issue with access to the full repository context

AI-generated architecture diagram from repository analysis with chat interface

Repository file tree with inline code viewer

📋 GSD (Get Shit Done) Workflow

Structured planning system with execution tracking:

• Phase-based project planning
• Planning document editor with markdown preview
• Execution tracking and status
• Branch-specific planning
• Commands: /gsd:plan-phase, /gsd:add-phase, /gsd:execute-phase, /gsd:discuss-phase, /gsd:map-codebase
• Version management and auto-update

GSD project state view showing current phase, decisions, and next actions

🔌 MCP Server Integration

Comprehensive MCP (Model Context Protocol) server support:

• 16+ Supported Servers - GitHub, AWS (EKS, ECS, Diagram, Documentation, Terraform, API), Datadog, Atlassian, Context7, Chrome DevTools, Figma, Rollbar, Electron, Filesystem, Server-Time
• OAuth 2.1 Authentication - Full PKCE flow with credential encryption
• Credential Management - Encrypted storage using Electron safeStorage
• Tool Caching - Performance optimization for frequently used tools
• Status Monitoring - Real-time connection status (connected, needs-auth, failed)
• Enable/Disable - Toggle servers per project

Per-server configuration: command, arguments, environment variables, auto-approve tools, and connection status

💻 Integrated Terminal

Full xterm.js terminal emulator with advanced features:

• Multiple terminal tabs
• Search (Cmd+F) with history
• Word wrap toggle
• VS Code theme integration
• Drag-and-drop file paths
• Session serialization and restore
• OSC-7 current directory parsing

Terminal with colorized file listing showing project directory structure

📑 11 Sidebar Tabs

Complete workspace navigation:

1. History - Chat archive and search
2. Workspaces - Projects and chats
3. Clusters - Kubernetes clusters
4. GSD - Project planning
5. GitHub - GitHub integration and PR management
6. Agents - Agent management
7. Skills - Skills library
8. MCPs - MCP server list
9. Terminal - Terminal sessions
10. Claws - Messaging integrations (Slack, WhatsApp)
11. Prompts - Saved prompts library

📊 Session Flow Visualization

Visual conversation flow using ReactFlow:

• See user messages, assistant responses, and tool calls as connected nodes
• Track thinking blocks, background tasks, and agent spawns
• Understand conversation structure at a glance
• Live updates as conversation progresses
• Zoom, pan, and fit-to-view controls

Visual session flow showing conversation structure and tool execution

🔀 Workflows

Visual workflow system for complex automations:

• Flowchart view showing MCP server connections, tools, and agents
• Markdown documentation view
• Review mode with Claude integration
• Build multi-step workflows connecting MCP tools and agents
• Visual debugging of workflow execution paths

Workflow flowchart showing MCP integrations and tool execution paths

Subagent flowchart view showing tools available to each agent

🦞 Claws (Messaging Integrations)

Connect external messaging platforms to Claw agents:

• Slack Integration - Socket Mode connection for real-time messaging
• WhatsApp Integration - QR code pairing via Baileys library
• Agent Routing - Route messages to specific Claw agents
• Trigger Configuration - Set up message triggers and auto-responses
• Channel Management - Connect multiple channels per integration

Headless agent configuration with trigger type (Cron, GitHub, Slack, WhatsApp), system instruction, and execution history

📝 Prompts Library

Manage and use saved system prompts across agent sessions:

• Categorized Library - Organize prompts by type (MCP, Chat, Background, Analysis)
• Live Editor - Edit prompt content with character count and instant preview
• Agent Integration - Use prompts as system context in any agent chat
• 11+ Built-in Prompts - Chat title generation, code analysis, architecture review, and more

Prompts library with categorized system prompts and live editor

Agent chat initiated from Prompts view with full tool execution tree

📊 Additional Features

• Settings - 15+ configuration tabs (appearance, keyboard, MCP, models, Kubernetes, beta features, etc.)
• File Attachments - Image uploads and file mentions in chat
• Desktop Notifications - System notifications for task completion
• Update Checker - Automatic update notifications
• VPN Connectivity Check - Optional internal URL monitoring for corporate environments

Installation

macOS

Download the latest release from GitHub Releases:

• Apple Silicon (M1/M2/M3): Claw-[version]-arm64-mac.zip
• Intel: Claw-[version]-mac.zip

Extract the ZIP and drag Claw.app to your Applications folder.

Build from Source

Prerequisites:

• Flox - Development environment manager
• Python 3 - For native module compilation
• Xcode Command Line Tools (macOS) - xcode-select --install

Steps:

# 1. Clone repository
git clone https://github.com/jaydeland/claw.git
cd claw

# 2. Activate Flox environment (provides bun and electron)
flox activate

# 3. Install JavaScript dependencies
bun install

# 4. Download Claude Code binary (required for agent functionality)
bun run claude:download

# 5. Build and package
bun run build
bun run package:mac  # or package:win, package:linux

Built packages will be in the release/ directory.

Development

# Daily workflow
flox activate          # Once per terminal session (provides bun, electron)
bun run dev            # Start with hot reload

# Database operations
bun run db:generate    # Generate migrations from schema changes
bun run db:push        # Push schema directly (dev only, no migrations)
bun run db:studio      # Open Drizzle Studio database browser

# Icon generation
bun run icon:generate      # Regenerate all platform icons
bun run icon:generate:mac  # macOS only (ICNS)
bun run icon:generate:win  # Windows only (ICO)

Architecture

Tech Stack:

• Desktop: Electron 33.4.5, electron-vite, electron-builder
• UI: React 19, TypeScript 5.4.5, Tailwind CSS 3.4, Radix UI, Motion 11
• State Management: Jotai (UI state), Zustand (persistence), React Query (server state)
• Backend IPC: tRPC 11 with trpc-electron for type-safe communication
• Database: Drizzle ORM 0.45 + better-sqlite3 11.8
• AI SDK: @anthropic-ai/claude-code 0.2.12
• Terminal: xterm.js 5.3 with canvas, fit, search, weblinks addons
• Git: simple-git 3.28, native git commands
• Kubernetes: kubernetesjs 0.7.6, AWS SDK for EKS
• MCP: Native MCP client with OAuth 2.1 support

Database:

• Location: {userData}/data/agents.db (SQLite with WAL mode)
• Auto-migrations: Runs on app startup from drizzle/ folder (dev) or resources/migrations (packaged)
• Main Tables:
  • projects - Local project folders with Git remote info
  • chats - Chat sessions with worktree paths and PR tracking
  • sub_chats - Sub-chat tabs with messages and session IDs
  • claude_code_settings - App configuration including AWS SSO credentials
  • background_tasks - Background agent task tracking
  • conductor_jobs - Kanban task data
  • mcp_credentials - Encrypted MCP OAuth tokens with expiration

Authentication Storage:

• Billing method: localStorage (onboarding:billing-method)
• AWS credentials: Encrypted in database using Electron safeStorage
• MCP OAuth tokens: Encrypted in database with automatic refresh

Troubleshooting

Architecture Mismatch (better-sqlite3)

If you see mach-o file, but is an incompatible architecture errors after pulling code:

# Clean reinstall for correct architecture
rm -rf node_modules/better-sqlite3
bun install
# The postinstall script automatically runs electron-rebuild

This occurs when switching between Intel and Apple Silicon machines.

Database Migration Issues

If the app fails to start with database errors:

# Check database location
ls -la ~/Library/Application\ Support/Claw/data/agents.db

# Backup and reset (WARNING: deletes all local data)
rm -rf ~/Library/Application\ Support/Claw/

The app will recreate the database with all migrations on next launch.

Remote Debugging (for MCP development)

The app enables remote debugging on port 9223 in development mode:

# Test debugger endpoint
curl http://localhost:9223/json

# Configure electron-mcp-server in Claude Desktop
# Add to ~/.claude/mcp.json (server auto-scans ports 9222-9225)

License

Apache License 2.0 - see LICENSE for details.

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Built with Claude Code 🤖