I built a terminal where one AI CLI supervises the others, so overnight runs actually finish

Lugiax — Tue, 15 Sep 2026 17:28:24 +0000

Problem: I run several AI CLIs at once (Claude Code, Codex, Qwen). Two things kept breaking overnight runs: an agent quits after an hour (network error, or it just decides it's done), and sub-agents fudge their reports when they hand work back. The existing tools let me see many agents. None of them made one agent responsible for the others.

What Polter does: it's a Ghostty fork with an MCP layer. Any MCP-capable CLI can be the supervisor. It opens tabs, starts other CLIs, types into them, reads their screens. Workers report into a group chat and a shared task list. If a worker's screen goes quiet, the supervisor is told. If the supervisor goes quiet, Polter pokes it.

Here's what that actually looks like:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_u-pgdNeqCc

How it compares (from each project's README/docs, Sept 2026 — correct me if I got something wrong):

	Polter	Claude Code Agent View	cmux	herdr	Claude Squad
Works with any CLI (Codex, Qwen, opencode…)	Yes	No, Claude Code sessions only	Yes	Yes	Claude Code, Codex, Gemini, Aider
Agents can drive the terminal (read screen, type, open tabs)	Yes, via MCP	No	Yes, via CLI + socket	Yes, via socket	No
One agent supervises others (roles, task list, group chat)	Built in	No (you supervise)	You build it on the API	You build it on the API	No
Stopped worker → someone is notified	Supervisor agent is told; it can restart	You are notified; unexpected exits auto-restart	You are notified	You are notified (state in sidebar)	Not mentioned
Supervisor itself gets nudged if idle	Yes	No	No	No	No
Needs API keys	No, uses your CLIs' own login	No	No	No	No
Platform	macOS, Windows (63/72 actions), Linux from source	Wherever Claude Code runs	macOS only	macOS, Linux, Windows beta	macOS, Linux
Offline / no account	Yes	—	Yes	Yes	Yes

Honest gaps: only Claude Code is tested end-to-end as supervisor. Codex/Qwen/opencode work fine as workers; their supervisor path is untested. Windows is missing 9 actions. It's a fork, so upstream Ghostty updates get merged with some lag.

What Polter won't do: answer permission prompts for an agent, unlock a tab you've locked, or bypass a CLI's own permissions. Those are hard-coded, not prompts.

MIT licensed: https://github.com/Lugia123/polter

DEV Community: Lugiax

I built a terminal where one AI CLI supervises the others, so overnight runs actually finish