Leon

Posted on Mar 30

Tap: The Interface Protocol for AI Agents — Forge Once, Run Forever

#ai #browserautomation #mcp #opensource

The Problem

AI agents need to operate interfaces — read data, click buttons, fill forms. But using AI for every step is slow, expensive, and unreliable.

The Insight

Operating an interface is a solved problem the moment you figure out how. The hard part is understanding the page — finding the API, locating the right selector. That's what AI is good at. Executing the same steps again? That doesn't need AI at all.

Tap: A New Paradigm

Tap is a universal protocol that separates the figuring out from the doing:

forge_inspect → forge_verify → forge_save → tap.run
    AI analyzes      AI tests       AI saves     runs forever, zero AI

One agent forges a tap. Every agent benefits.

The Protocol: 8 + 16

Tap follows the POSIX philosophy — minimal kernel, maximal possibility:

8 kernel primitives: eval, pointer, keyboard, nav, wait, screenshot, tap, capabilities
16 stdlib operations: click, type, hover, scroll, fetch, find, cookies, download...

A new runtime implements 8 methods, gets 16 operations for free.

Two Runtimes

Chrome Extension — uses your real browser session, no API keys
Playwright — headless capable, no extension needed

81 Ready-to-Use Skills

X/Twitter, Reddit, GitHub, YouTube, Bilibili, Zhihu, Xiaohongshu, Weibo, Medium, arXiv — 41 sites covered.

MCP Native

Tap is an MCP server. Add it to Claude Code or any MCP-compatible agent:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "tap": {
      "command": "tap",
      "args": ["mcp"]
    }
  }
}

Quick Start

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/LeonTing1010/tap/master/install.sh | sh
tap install          # install 81 community skills
tap github trending  # try it

How It Works

The forge pipeline lets AI create deterministic scripts:

forge_inspect(url) — AI analyzes the page: APIs, SSR state, DOM structure
forge_verify(url, expr) — AI tests extraction logic
forge_save(site, name) — saves as .tap.js
tap.run(site, name) — runs forever, zero AI

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