tuic CLI

The tuic command line tool lets you control TUICommander from the terminal. It combines the best of VS Code’s code CLI, Zed’s editor integration, and tmux’s session management into a single binary.

Installation

From the app: Settings > General > Command Line Interface > Install tuic CLI

First launch: TUICommander offers to install the CLI on first run.

From the CLI itself: tuic install-cli

The binary is installed to:

macOS: /usr/local/bin/tuic (requires admin password)
Linux: /usr/local/bin/tuic (requires sudo)
Windows: %LOCALAPPDATA%\Microsoft\WindowsApps\tuic.exe (no admin needed)

The CLI auto-updates silently when TUICommander starts — no manual update needed.

Opening Files and Repos

# Open a file (launches TUICommander if not running)
tuic file.rs

# Open at specific line and column
tuic file.rs:42
tuic file.rs:42:10
tuic open --goto file.rs:42

# Open the current directory as a repo
tuic .
tuic /path/to/project

# Open with --wait (for use as $EDITOR)
tuic open --wait file.rs

# Diff two files
tuic diff old.rs new.rs

Using as $EDITOR

export EDITOR="tuic open --wait"
git commit  # opens commit message in TUICommander

Session Management

These commands mirror tmux semantics:

# List all sessions
tuic ls

# Create a new session
tuic new
tuic new -n "my-session"
tuic new -n "build" /path/to/repo

# Send input to a session
tuic send <id-or-name> "make test" Enter

# Capture session output
tuic capture <id-or-name>
tuic capture <id-or-name> --format raw

# Kill a session
tuic kill <id-or-name>

# Resize a session
tuic resize <id-or-name> 120x40

# Pause/resume output
tuic pause <id-or-name>
tuic resume <id-or-name>

Session targets accept full UUIDs, ID prefixes, or session names.

Agent Orchestration

# Spawn an AI agent
tuic agent spawn claude
tuic agent spawn codex /path/to/repo

# List running agents
tuic agent ls

# Send a message to an agent
tuic agent send <id> "fix the tests"

tmux Compatibility

tuic can act as a drop-in replacement for tmux. When invoked as tmux (via symlink), it translates tmux commands to TUICommander equivalents.

Setting Up the Alias

# Create tmux -> tuic symlink
tuic alias

# Remove the alias (restores original tmux if installed)
tuic alias --remove

Supported tmux Commands

When invoked as tmux, the following commands are supported:

tmux Command	Behavior
`tmux`	Create new session in cwd
`tmux new-session -s name`	Create named session
`tmux list-sessions`	List sessions
`tmux kill-session -t target`	Kill session
`tmux kill-server`	Kill all sessions
`tmux send-keys -t target "cmd" Enter`	Send input
`tmux capture-pane -t target`	Capture output
`tmux resize-pane -t target -x 120 -y 40`	Resize
`tmux attach-session`	Focus TUICommander window
`tmux has-session -t target`	Check if session exists (exit code)

Key names are translated: Enter, Space, Tab, Escape, C-c, C-d, C-z, etc.

System Commands

# Check TUICommander status
tuic status

# Install CLI to system PATH
tuic install-cli
tuic install-cli --path /custom/path

# Create/remove tmux alias
tuic alias
tuic alias --remove

IPC Architecture

The CLI communicates with TUICommander via IPC:

macOS/Linux: Unix domain socket at ~/.config/com.tuic.commander/mcp.sock
Windows: Named pipe at \\.\pipe\tuicommander-mcp

Override with $TUIC_SOCKET environment variable.

If TUICommander is not running, tuic open and tuic new will launch it automatically.

Keyboard shortcuts

TUICommander