Pylonite

A SQLite-backed kanban board built for AI agents and humans. Manage tasks, track progress, and collaborate through a simple CLI or an interactive TUI -- no login, no server, no setup.

Each project directory gets its own database stored at ~/.pylonite/dbs/. The current $USER is automatically recorded as author for all actions.

Board overview

Interactive TUI

Task detail

Task detail with move overlay

Activity log

Install

gem install pylonite

Requires Ruby >= 3.1.

Quick Start

cd ~/my-project

# Add some tasks
pylonite add "Fix compiler bug when adding ints and floats"
pylonite add "Write integration tests" --assign alice -d "Cover all edge cases"
pylonite add "Deploy v2" --board todo

# Work on a task
pylonite move 1 in_progress
pylonite comment 1 "Investigating type mismatch in binary ops"
pylonite assign 1 bob

# Check the board
pylonite list

# Open the interactive TUI
pylonite tui

Commands

Task Creation & Editing

pylonite add "task title"                          # Add to backlog
pylonite add "task" --board todo --assign alice     # With options
pylonite add "task" -d "description here"           # With description

pylonite edit 3 --title "New title"                # Update title
pylonite edit 3 -d "Updated description"           # Update description

pylonite subtask 1 "Write unit tests"              # Create a subtask

Viewing Tasks

pylonite show 1                  # Full task detail (comments, history, blockers, subtasks)
pylonite list                    # All non-archived tasks, grouped by board
pylonite list --board in_progress  # Filter by board
pylonite list --all              # Include archived tasks
pylonite search "compiler"       # Search by title or description

Workflow

pylonite move 1 in_progress   # Move between boards
pylonite move 1 done
pylonite archive 5            # Shortcut for move to archived
pylonite assign 1 alice       # Assign a task

Comments

pylonite comment 1 "Blocked on API changes"

Dependencies

pylonite block 3 1       # Task 1 blocks task 3
pylonite unblock 3 1     # Remove the blocker
pylonite subtask 1 "Fix int+float case"   # Subtasks are also tracked as dependencies

TUI

pylonite tui

An interactive terminal UI showing all boards as columns. Navigate with:

Key	Action
`h` `j` `k` `l` / arrows	Navigate between columns and tasks
`Enter`	View task detail
`b`	Back to board view
`m`	Move task to another board
`c`	Add a comment
`L`	View activity log
`a`	Toggle archived column
`?`	Show help overlay
`q`	Quit

Other

pylonite help                                    # Show full help
pylonite internal appropriate OLD_DB_PATH        # Re-map a database after renaming a project directory

Boards

Board	Description
`backlog`	Default for new tasks
`todo`	Ready to work on
`in_progress`	Currently being worked on
`done`	Completed
`archived`	Hidden from default list view

How It Works

Each project directory maps to a SQLite database at ~/.pylonite/dbs/<dirname>_<hash>.sqlite3
The hash is derived from the full path, so identically-named projects in different locations get separate databases
Every action (create, move, assign, comment) is recorded in a task history with actor and timestamp
Tasks support blockers (task A blocks task B) and subtasks (hierarchical breakdown)
No authentication -- designed for local use where everyone has full access

For AI Agents

Pylonite is designed to be used by AI agents as a lightweight task tracker. Key points:

All commands are simple, single-line invocations with predictable output
pylonite search "query" helps recover task IDs after losing context
pylonite show ID gives complete task state including full history
pylonite help provides a complete API reference with examples
Task IDs are stable integers that auto-increment per project

Running Tests

bundle install
rake test

License

MIT

pylonite

Runtime