MotionWorks

A direct-manipulation motion design layer for projects built with AI coding agents.

MotionWorks runs over your local app so you can select a real element, tune motion by feel, replay it, compare against the original, and apply the result. Adjustable values live in CSS custom properties, so the browser can preview them immediately and the local daemon can write precise changes back to source.

Describe to create. Manipulate to refine.

Quick start

Install the single package and initialize the project:

npm install -D motionworks
npx motionworks init

init adds .motionworks/ to .gitignore, removes a stale MotionWorks MCP entry if one exists, and writes a generated MOTIONWORKS.md guide plus a short reference stanza for Claude Code and Codex. In React projects it also confirms the package install when needed.

Start your app and the MotionWorks daemon in separate terminals:

npm run dev
npx motionworks

For React, follow the generated guide to mount MotionWorksProvider once in a development-only, independent React root. For any other page, load the standalone overlay before </body>:

<script src="http://127.0.0.1:52340/motionworks.js"></script>

MotionWorks can also serve a static directory and inject the overlay automatically:

npx motionworks serve .

Related MCP server: pincushion-mcp

The CSS contract

Each adjustable value has one canonical declaration in a real stylesheet on the registered element's rule:

.card {
  --mw-radius: 120px;
  --mw-response: 0.18;
}

React effects register only the schema. The hook reads baselines from CSS; effect code consumes them with readParams and responds to motionworks:change through onParamsChange:

import { useEffect, useRef } from 'react';
import { onParamsChange, readParams, useMotionWorks } from 'motionworks/react';

const schema = {
  name: 'Magnetic card',
  params: {
    radius: { type: 'spatial-radius', label: 'Radius', unit: 'px' },
    response: { type: 'temporal-response', label: 'Response' },
  },
} as const;

function MagneticCard() {
  const ref = useRef<HTMLDivElement>(null);
  useMotionWorks(ref, schema);

  useEffect(() => {
    const el = ref.current;
    if (!el) return;
    const effect = createMagneticEffect(el, readParams(el, schema.params));
    const sync = () => effect.update(readParams(el, schema.params));
    const stop = onParamsChange(el, sync);
    return () => {
      stop();
      effect.destroy();
    };
  }, []);

  return <div ref={ref} className="card" />;
}

Plain HTML can register the same schema with data-motionworks and use window.MotionWorks.readParams / window.MotionWorks.onParamsChange.

What happens on Apply

Apply is durable before it is automatic:

1. The overlay appends an entry to .motionworks/changes.json.

2. The daemon edits the unique matching CSS declaration directly.

3. If the declaration is ambiguous, the daemon runs Claude or Codex when available.

4. If no agent can complete it, the entry remains pending for Copy prompt and npx motionworks changes.

The agent changes exactly the listed declarations and acknowledges a manual writeback with npx motionworks ack <id>. npx motionworks status reports the currently selected effect when a designer refers to “this one.”

Package exports

The repository has one publishable package, motionworks:

React and ReactDOM are optional peers; non-React pages use the standalone bundle.

CLI

npx motionworks                          Start the local daemon
npx motionworks serve <dir>              Serve a static site with the overlay
npx motionworks changes [--json|--brief] Show pending journal entries
npx motionworks ack <id>|--all           Acknowledge manual writebacks
npx motionworks status                   Show daemon and current selection
npx motionworks revert <id>              Revert an applied entry
npx motionworks init                     Set up the project and agent guide

Automatic agent execution is enabled when claude or codex is found. Use --no-agent for manual handoff or --agent=claude|codex|off to choose explicitly. The daemon binds to 127.0.0.1:52340; MOTIONWORKS_PORT or --port changes the port.

Development

The repository is an npm workspace with one package under packages/motionworks. It builds with tsup and tests with Vitest.

npm install
npm run build
npm run typecheck
npm test

The completed 0.5.0 bridge rebuild is recorded in docs/plans/bridge-rebuild.md; the maintained architecture and contracts live in docs/.

License

MIT © John Kim