physicscode

physicscode is an open source agentic AI coding environment for physics-focused software, simulations, analysis, and research engineering, built by PAI Dynamics.

Install

Install dependencies from the repository root:

bun install

Run the CLI/TUI locally:

bun run dev

Run the desktop app locally (Tauri, the primary desktop shell):

bun run dev:desktop

This requires the Rust toolchain and platform Tauri prerequisites — see packages/desktop/README.md and the Tauri prerequisites guide.

Build the downloadable desktop app:

cd packages/desktop
bun run tauri build

Packaged desktop artifacts are written under packages/desktop/src-tauri/target/release/bundle/ (per-platform subdirectories, e.g. dmg/, deb/, rpm/, nsis/).

An Electron build of the same UI also exists in packages/desktop-electron (bun run dev:desktop:electron) but is being phased out in favor of Tauri — see that package's README for status.

Build the CLI executable:

cd packages/physicscode
bun run build

The build outputs platform-specific executables under packages/physicscode/dist/. Those binaries are the artifacts to publish for users who want to download and run physicscode directly.

Connect a Model Provider

physicscode doesn't ship with any API keys — you connect your own. It supports 75+ providers (Anthropic, OpenAI, Google, Azure, Bedrock, local models, and more) via Models.dev.

Interactive (recommended): run physicscode, then inside the TUI run:

/connect

Pick a provider and paste your API key. It's written to ~/.local/share/physicscode/auth.json on your machine — this file is never part of the repo and should never be committed anywhere.

Environment variables: each provider also reads its standard env var, e.g.

export ANTHROPIC_API_KEY=sk-ant-...
export OPENAI_API_KEY=sk-...

Config file: provider behavior (base URL, proxies, model allowlists) can be set in physicscode.json — but never put a live API key in this file:

{
  "provider": {
    "anthropic": {
      "options": { "baseURL": "https://api.anthropic.com/v1" }
    }
  }
}

Full reference: Providers docs.

Science MCP

physicscode-science (provenance-aware retrieval for scientific software) is already wired into physicscode itself once you're logged in — no setup needed. To use it from Claude Code or Codex instead — on this machine or any other — see physicscode-science/docs/mcp-clients.md for the exact claude mcp add / codex mcp add commands, covering both the hosted endpoint (works from any machine with a PhysicsCode API key) and running your own local index.

VS Code Extension

The VS Code extension lives in sdks/vscode. Before publishing a new extension build, bump the version field in sdks/vscode/package.json; the Visual Studio Marketplace rejects uploads that reuse an existing version.

Build the VSIX:

cd sdks/vscode
bunx @vscode/vsce package --no-dependencies -o dist/physicscode.vsix

Publish to the Visual Studio Marketplace:

bunx @vscode/vsce publish --packagePath dist/physicscode.vsix

The extension publisher id is paidynamicsch, so the Marketplace extension id is paidynamicsch.physicscode. If publishing from a new machine, first run bunx @vscode/vsce login paidynamicsch and provide a Personal Access Token with Marketplace > Manage permission.

License

PhysicsCode started as a fork of OpenCode and has since diverged significantly for physics-focused workflows. Notices for OpenCode and other third-party materials are preserved in Licenses.