Apple Intelligence TUI

A privacy-first terminal interface to Apple's on-device Foundation Models. Runs entirely on-device — no data leaves your Mac.

Requires macOS 26+ with Apple Intelligence enabled and Apple Silicon.

---

Why

Cloud AI (ChatGPT, Claude) sees everything you send. Apple Intelligence runs the model on your device. This TUI gives you a fast keyboard-driven interface for sensitive tasks — drafting, summarising, proofreading — without any data leaving your machine.

---

Features

• Privacy-first — 100% on-device via Apple Foundation Models, zero network calls
• Full TUI — Claude Code-inspired aesthetic, dark, dense, terminal-native
• Pipe mode — ai "summarize this" < file.txt with no UI, pure stdin/stdout
• 12 built-in commands — writing tools, smart reply, content tagging, extraction
• Command picker — type / to browse, ↑↓ to navigate, Enter to select
• Plugin system — add custom /commands via TOML files in ~/.config/apple-tui/commands/
• Tool use — model can read local files and clipboard mid-conversation
• Persistent sessions — conversation history saved to ~/.config/apple-tui/sessions/
• Guardrail toggle — switch between default and permissive content transformations

---

Requirements

macOS 26+
Apple Silicon (M-series)
Apple Intelligence enabled in System Settings
Python 3.11+

Enable Apple Intelligence: System Settings → Apple Intelligence & Siri → Enable Apple Intelligence

---

Installation

Homebrew (recommended):

brew tap amirnaeem/tap
brew install apple-tui

pipx (isolated, global ai command):

pipx install git+https://github.com/amirnaeem/apple-writing.git

From source:

git clone https://github.com/amirnaeem/apple-writing.git
cd apple-writing
python -m venv .venv && source .venv/bin/activate
pip install -e .

---

Usage

# Interactive TUI
ai

# One-shot pipe mode
ai "summarize this text"
ai "what are the action items?" < meeting-notes.txt
cat contract.txt | ai /formal

# Structured JSON output (pipe to jq)
ai --json /actions < meeting-notes.txt
ai --json /bullets < report.txt | jq '.[]'
cat notes.txt | ai --json /tag

# With options
ai --guardrails permissive "rewrite this"
ai help

Keyboard shortcuts

Key	Action
Enter	Send message
Shift+Enter	New line in input
/	Open command picker
↑ ↓	Navigate picker
Enter / Tab	Select command
Esc	Dismiss picker
Ctrl+G	Toggle guardrails
Ctrl+N	New session
Ctrl+L	Clear history
Ctrl+C	Quit

---

Built-in Commands

Command	Description
/summarize	2–4 sentence summary
/bullets	Key points as bullet list
/formal	Rewrite in professional tone
/friendly	Rewrite in warm casual tone
/concise	Make significantly shorter
/proofread	Fix grammar, spelling, punctuation
/table	Reorganise as a structured table
/reply	Draft 3 reply options (Smart Reply)
/notify	Summarise notifications
/tag	Generate topic tags (Content Tagging)
/actions	Extract action items and tasks
/entities	Extract people, orgs, locations

---

Custom Plugins

Add your own commands by dropping a .toml file into ~/.config/apple-tui/commands/:

# ~/.config/apple-tui/commands/legal.toml
name        = "/legal"
description = "Simplify legal text to plain English"
template    = "Rewrite the following legal text in plain English. Preserve all meaning:\n\n"

Plugins appear in the command picker automatically on next launch. Share them as gists.

---

Tool Use

In chat mode, the model can invoke tools mid-conversation:

• read_file — reads a local file by path (up to 100KB)
• clipboard_read — reads your current clipboard contents
• write_file — writes text to a file in your home directory (model asks for confirmation first)

Example: "Summarize the file at ~/Documents/report.pdf" — the model will call read_file automatically.

---

How It Works

• Uses apple-fm-sdk — Apple's official Python SDK for Foundation Models
• Chat uses a persistent LanguageModelSession (maintains conversation history across turns)
• Commands use a fresh PERMISSIVE session per invocation (stateless text transformation)
• Pipe mode shares the same stream logic as the TUI — same model, no UI overhead
• Streaming via session.stream_response() — async generator yielding full snapshot strings
• Built with Textual

Context window: 4096 tokens (input + output). For large pastes, use /summarize or /bullets first.

---

Development

The app runs in MOCK_MODE on non-macOS systems (Linux, CI), simulating the SDK so you can develop and test without Apple Silicon.

# Install dev dependencies
pip install -e .

# Run tests (works on any platform)
pytest test_app.py test_new_modules.py -v

# Run directly without installing
python -m apple_tui

Project structure

apple_tui/
  __init__.py      # version
  __main__.py      # CLI entry point (pipe mode, help, TUI launcher)
  app.py           # Textual TUI application
  plugins.py       # TOML plugin loader
  sessions.py      # Persistent session storage
  tools.py         # SDK Tool subclasses (read_file, clipboard_read, write_file)
docs/ideas/        # Brainstorm one-pagers
test_app.py        # TUI pytest suite (49 tests)
test_new_modules.py # Module pytest suite (65 tests)

---

Roadmap

• Homebrew formula
• write_file tool (with confirmation prompt)
• Structured output mode — ai --json /actions < notes.txt | jq '.[]'
• Named sessions with --session <name>
• Context window usage indicator

---

License

MIT