Quickstart

From nothing to a running agent in about five minutes.

1. Install

Boba ships as a single self-contained binary — no Node or Bun required at runtime.


npm install -g botbandit

2. Run it


boba

With no config on disk, the first run opens a setup wizard. It looks for agent CLIs already installed on your PATH — claude (Claude Code) and codex — and offers to build a starter config around them, so if you already have one you need no API key at all.

No agent CLI, or you’d rather use something else? Pick Other provider… and the wizard walks you through:

Choice	What it needs
ChatGPT subscription	An OAuth login — no API key (`gpt-6.1-sol`, `gpt-6-astra`, …)
OpenAI API	`OPENAI_API_KEY`
OpenRouter	`OPENROUTER_API_KEY`
Alibaba Model Studio	`ALIBABA_API_KEY` (Qwen, GLM, Kimi)
Ollama	A running server — the wizard probes it and lists your local models

The wizard writes ~/.botbandit/botbandit.config.yaml and drops you into your first session. It never overwrites an existing config.

To re-run it later, move the config aside and run boba init.

3. Drive the agent

You’re now in the TUI — the primary way to work with Boba.

Type a prompt and press Enter.
Esc interrupts a running turn.
Tool calls that need your sign-off appear inline — approve or deny without leaving the transcript.
/exit or /quit leaves; Ctrl+C twice force-quits.

Your session keeps running after you leave: it is owned by a local daemon, not by the terminal window.

4. One-shot prompts

For scripting and pipelines, skip the TUI:


boba run "Summarize what this repo does."

Next steps

Concepts — sessions, profiles, the crew, approvals.
Operate — running Boba day to day.
Self-host the web UI — reach your agents from a browser and your phone.