coding-academy

Coding Academy

A cute CLI desktop pet for AI coding tools.

It sits beside your terminal, stays out of the way, and quietly turns real coding work into a tiny auto-battling adventure.

• You keep vibecoding.
• Your buddy scouts, fights, loots, and grows on the side.
• When you want a payoff, you check in and cash out the run.

Why this exists

Most coding tools are either:

• all business, no charm
• distracting toys that break flow

Coding Academy is aiming for the middle:

• visible like a desktop pet
• quiet like a sidecar, not a second task
• rewarding like a tiny idle game
• meaningful because it reflects real coding effort

This project is inspired by:

• Stone Story RPG
• Battle! Brave Academy
• bongocat-style companions
• the always-visible /buddy feel inside Claude Code

What it feels like

You work in your normal AI coding tool.

The buddy sits beside the terminal and reacts to what is already happening:

• file reads become scouting
• edits and patches become attacks
• failed checks become enemy hits
• completed tasks become victories
• token and effort buildup become burst charge

Then, when you want a little hit of satisfaction:

• /coding-academy-check-in

That turns your recent coding effort into:

• XP
• combo
• clues
• loot
• a short run recap

See it

Sidecar mode

The terminal stays yours. The buddy lives beside it.

Check-in payoff

The payoff is short, readable, and a little game-y.

Install

Windows PowerShell

powershell -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -Command "irm https://raw.githubusercontent.com/lyingbird/coding-academy/main/scripts/install-claude.ps1 | iex"

macOS / Linux

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/lyingbird/coding-academy/main/scripts/install-claude.sh | bash

Start in 10 seconds

From any folder:

claude

Then inside Claude Code:

/coding-academy

When you want the payoff:

/coding-academy-check-in

If Claude was already open during install, close every Claude window once and reopen it.

What you get right now

• a sidecar-first Claude Code companion
• a tiny hero that levels up from real coding activity
• a burst/check-in loop for lightweight rewards
• a cleaner first-open flow that feels like hatching a buddy
• a multi-CLI runtime foundation for Codex, Gemini, OpenAI-compatible shells, Qwen, and future wrappers

Product shape

Coding Academy is built in three layers:

• host integrations
  • Claude Code today
  • Codex, Gemini, OpenAI-compatible shells, Qwen, and other wrappers next
• academy hub
  • one local event bus and shared state model
• sidecar shell
  • the actual player-facing buddy

That means the game logic exists once. Different AI tools only need to emit lifecycle events into the same runtime.

For players

If you just want to try it:

• install once
• open claude
• type /coding-academy

Short guide:

• Quickstart

For contributors

Useful entry points:

• Replan
• pnpm build
• pnpm typecheck
• pnpm plugin:bundle
• pnpm plugin:validate

Core packages:

• packages/shared
• packages/runtime
• packages/sidecar-shell
• packages/plugin-claude
• packages/cli

Current status

This is already usable, but still early.

The current priority is not “more features at any cost”. The priority is:

• make the Claude sidecar feel delightful
• keep the install dead simple
• make the buddy readable at a glance
• expand to more CLI hosts without losing charm

Repository

• GitHub: lyingbird/coding-academy