Phantom Shell — a haunted terminal possessed by a local open-weight model

#devchallenge #hf26challenge #hacktoberfest #opensource

Hacktoberfest Open-Source AI Challenge: Ghost in the Machine Submission 👻🌼

Phantom Shell 👻 — Ghost in the Machine (Hacktoberfest 2026 Week 4)

Challenge: #devchallenge #hf26challenge — Week 4 Ghost in the Machine

Author: Ri Piao · X @pr742674

What I built

Phantom Shell is a CLI that lets an open-weight model possess your terminal.

You run a normal shell command. The phantom — a local model via Ollama — whispers a short, eerie commentary about what you just did. You can also chat with it, or drop into possess mode: an interactive haunted REPL.

If Ollama is not installed, a built-in mock ghost still demos the full UX so judges (and you) can try it offline in seconds.

Theme take: the “ghost” should live in the machine — open weights, local inference, no cloud API key. Privacy is the haunting.

Demo

git clone https://github.com/pr7426/ghost-in-the-machine.git
cd ghost-in-the-machine
python3 -m phantom_shell demo
# or:
./scripts/demo.sh

Interactive:

python3 -m phantom_shell possess
# phantom> echo boo
# phantom> .chat Who are you?
# phantom> .quit

With a real local model:

ollama pull llama3.2
python3 -m phantom_shell possess --model llama3.2

Sample transcript (checked into the repo): demo/sample_session.txt

Repository

🔗 Repo: https://github.com/pr7426/ghost-in-the-machine

License: MIT · Language: Python 3.10+ · Deps: stdlib only for core

Open-source AI used

Piece	Detail
Serving	Ollama (`/api/chat`)
Model	`llama3.2` by default (any Ollama open model works: `phi3`, `qwen2.5`, `gemma2`, …)
Offline	Mock ghost when Ollama is down
Optional path	llama.cpp / GGUF via Ollama or a local server (`--host`)

No closed SaaS LLM is required for the core experience.

Why open innovation matters (here)

Offline & private — command context and chat stay on-device; great for a personal shell.
Swappable weights — one flag changes the soul of the ghost; community models welcome.
Hackable — tiny stdlib client, MIT, easy to fork into prompts, tools, or a full agentic shell.
Inclusive demos — mock mode means anyone can run the challenge submission without a GPU.

Open weights turn “AI feature” into something you can own, inspect, and remix — which is the point of a Ghost that lives in your machine.

Thanks Hacktoberfest + DEV for Week 4 — may your shells stay haunted. 🎃

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