pi-ghostty-native-editor0.1.1

pi-ghostty-native-editor

macOS-style text editing for the prompt editor of the pi coding agent, tuned for the Ghostty terminal.

pi's prompt editor uses Emacs-style keys and has no text selection. This extension makes it behave like a native macOS text field: select with Shift+arrows or the mouse, use Cmd+C / Cmd+X / Cmd+V / Cmd+Z / Cmd+A, and type over the selection to replace it.

Features

Selection

Editing

Mouse

Only in pi's fullscreen mode, which is the default (tuiMode: "fullscreen"). In regular mode the terminal owns the mouse.

Optional: Enter inserts a newline, Shift+Enter submits

Off by default. When enabled, Enter inserts a newline and Shift+Enter submits, like chat apps that are built for multi-line messages. Enter still runs single-line slash commands (like /model) and picks the highlighted item when the autocomplete menu is open. See Configuration.

Installation

1. Install the pi package

pi install npm:pi-ghostty-native-editor

Or from git: pi install git:github.com/k7d/pi-ghostty-native-editor.

To try it for one session without installing:

pi -e npm:pi-ghostty-native-editor

2. Configure Ghostty

Ghostty handles Cmd+Z, Cmd+A, Cmd+X, Cmd+C, Cmd+↑/↓ and Shift+arrows itself, so pi never receives them. ghostty.conf in this package turns those bindings off or makes them conditional, so Ghostty forwards the keys to pi using the Kitty keyboard protocol.

In pi, run:

/native-editor configure-ghostty

This copies the keybindings to ~/.pi/agent/ghostty-native-editor.ghostty and adds an include for it to your Ghostty config (two lines, marked with a comment). It does nothing if the include is already there. If the ghostty CLI is available, the config is validated and the change is reverted when Ghostty rejects it. Then reload Ghostty's config with Cmd+Shift+, (or restart Ghostty).

To undo it:

/native-editor remove-ghostty

The Ghostty config used is the last existing one of $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/ghostty/config.ghostty, $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/ghostty/config, and on macOS ~/Library/Application Support/com.mitchellh.ghostty/config.ghostty and .../config (the same files Ghostty reads). If none exists, a new one is created.

config-file = ?/absolute/path/to/pi-ghostty-native-editor/ghostty.conf

What ghostty.conf changes:

Ghostty's defaults for Cmd+← / →, Option+← / → and Cmd+Backspace already work with pi and in the shell, so they are left alone. Programs that don't understand the forwarded keys, such as most shells, ignore them.

Configuration

Settings are stored in ~/.pi/agent/ghostty-native-editor.json. Change them with the /native-editor command, which applies right away:

/native-editor                      show the current settings and Ghostty status, and pick an option
/native-editor enter-newline on     Enter inserts a newline, Shift+Enter submits
/native-editor enter-newline off    Enter submits, Shift+Enter inserts a newline (default)
/native-editor configure-ghostty    add the keybindings to the Ghostty config
/native-editor remove-ghostty       remove them from the Ghostty config

Typing /native-editor (with the trailing space) lists these options in the autocomplete menu.

Or edit the file directly; it's read when pi starts:

{
	"enterInsertsNewline": true
}

Shift+Enter has to reach pi as its own key. Ghostty sends it correctly when pi enables the Kitty keyboard protocol, which pi does automatically. If you added keybind = shift+enter=text:\x1b\r for older pi versions, it still works.

Other terminals

The extension itself is terminal-agnostic. Cmd shortcuts work in any terminal that forwards Cmd (the "super" modifier) through the Kitty keyboard protocol, such as kitty (map cmd+z no_op, etc.) or WezTerm (with enable_kitty_keyboard = true and the default Cmd bindings disabled). Shift+arrow selection, mouse selection, Ctrl+C copy and the Enter swap work in most modern terminals without any configuration.

Inside tmux, enable extended keys (set -g extended-keys on, plus set -g extended-keys-format csi-u on tmux 3.5+) so modifiers aren't dropped.

How it works

The extension replaces pi's prompt editor with a subclass of pi's built-in CustomEditor (see pi's modal-editor.ts example). It adds a selection anchor, a redo stack, mouse handling and selection rendering on top of the base editor, and passes all other keys (app shortcuts, autocomplete, history, kill ring) through unchanged.

Copying uses pi's own clipboard helper, which uses the native clipboard locally and OSC 52 over SSH.

The extension relies on some internal (non-public) details of pi's editor, so a future pi release could break it. If that happens, pi remove npm:pi-ghostty-native-editor restores the default editor. Run /native-editor remove-ghostty first to restore Ghostty's keybindings too.

Tested with pi 1.3.0 and Ghostty 1.3.1 on macOS.

License

MIT