pi-delegate

Delegate implementation and tests to a local pi agent, with hooks that enforce dispatch discipline.

Claude acts as tech lead: it produces the probe, the task book, the acceptance script, and the verdict. pi writes the source code.

Claude never speaks the RPC protocol directly — the MCP server holds the pipe, which is what makes mid-run pi_steer and pi_abort possible.

Install

/plugin marketplace add LarryStanley/pi-delegate
/plugin install pi-delegate@pi-delegate

Run both inside Claude Code. The first command registers this repository as a plugin marketplace; the second installs the plugin from it. If the install summary says Run /reload-plugins to activate., run that too.

Requires Node ≥ 22 and a pi installation that is already set up. Dependencies are installed automatically from the committed lockfile — there is nothing to npm install yourself.

To update later:

/plugin marketplace update pi-delegate

To run a working copy instead of the published version:

claude --plugin-dir /path/to/pi-delegate

A --plugin-dir copy takes precedence over the installed one for that session, so you can test changes without uninstalling.

Then run /pi-delegate:setup for a guided first-run walkthrough: it checks pi and its provider, explains the discipline modes and asks which one you want, offers to fix anything fixable, and offers a verification dispatch before you start using the tools for real.

Configuration: nothing is required by default

pi_dispatch specifies no provider or model, so pi uses your own default (defaultProvider / defaultModel in ~/.pi/agent/settings.json). In other words: whatever model you already point pi at, dispatches go there too — anthropic, openai, litellm, ollama, LM Studio, or a local OpenAI-compatible server (e.g. omlx) all work the same way, with nothing to configure for this plugin specifically.

If you want to pin a different model long-term (for example, a cheap local model dedicated to dispatches while interactive pi uses something else), write ~/.claude/pi-delegate/config.json:

{
  "provider": "ollama",
  "model": "qwen3:8b",
  "timeout_s": 1500,
  "thinking": "off",
  "tools": "read,write,edit",
  "no_context_files": true,
  "drafter_patterns": ["-draft", "_assistant", "-assistant"]
}

Every field is optional. Resolution order is pi_dispatch call arguments → this file → pi's own defaults.

/pi-delegate:doctor tells you which model a dispatch will actually reach, and raises a problem only under conditions that genuinely hold.

The defaults below were measured, not guessed

To override, specify it directly in the pi_dispatch call (thinking, tools, no_context_files, append_system_prompt, provider, model, timeout_s).

--mode rpc, --session-id, --no-skills, and --no-extensions are structural and not overridable; --no-session is deliberately never passed (omitting it is what makes the session land on disk, which is what gives pi_transcript something to read).

Modes

Switch modes with /pi-delegate:mode <mode>; state lives in ~/.claude/pi-delegate/modes.json, remembered per project. "Existing product code" means a source file that already exists under the project root's src/; tasks/, scripts/, docs/, markdown, config files, and brand-new files are all allowed through.

strict is a discipline guardrail, not enforcement: the hook is only wired to Write|Edit, so editing the same file with Bash (sed -i, a heredoc, python - <<EOF, …) is never intercepted. There's always a way around it — it blocks editing the file yourself out of habit, not a deliberate workaround.

To make one hand-edit (a probe), run /pi-delegate:probe first for a one-time bypass.

MCP tools

How a dispatch works

The MCP server's activation spans the whole session; that's why it can still deliver a steer to the pi child's stdin mid-run, and why it — not the child process — decides when the run is over.

Known gaps

pi_stats only returns the tokens and duration_s already present in the verdict. spec §5's get_session_stats passthrough (including cost / context usage) is not yet implemented.

Documentation

Development

npm test                    # node --test, no external dependencies
claude plugin validate .

fixtures/fake-pi.mjs stands in for pi --mode rpc. It deliberately lives outside test/ — node --test treats any file under **/test/**/*.{cjs,mjs,js} as a test file, and putting it in test/ would add one permanently-passing phantom test.