Dev Station

A desktop development workspace for agencies: switch between client projects, run their dev services, work with AI coding agents (Claude Code, Cursor CLI) in embedded terminals, review diffs, commit and push  without juggling IDE windows. See PRODUCT.md, docs/Product_Specification.md and docs/ARCHITECTURE.md.

app/   Electron + React (Vite, Tailwind v4, shadcn/ui)   desktop client
api/   NestJS + Prisma + PostgreSQL   organizations, projects, integrations (Composio), sessions, activity

Requirements

• Node.js e" 22.12, Git on PATH
• PostgreSQL 14+ (local Docker works: see below)
• Optional: claude (Claude Code) and/or cursor-agent (Cursor CLI) on PATH; cursor / code for "Open in& "
• Optional: a Composio API key for GitHub / Linear / Notion connections

Run locally

# 1. Database (any Postgres works)
docker run -d --name devstation-pg -e POSTGRES_PASSWORD=devstation -e POSTGRES_DB=devstation -p 5544:5432 postgres:16

# 2. API   copy api/.env.template to api/.env.staging (or .env.local) and fill DATABASE_URL, JWT_SECRET, & 
cd api
npm install
npx dotenv -e .env.staging -- npx prisma migrate deploy   # applies prisma/migrations
npm run start:staging                                      # http://localhost:3000, Swagger at /api

# 3. Desktop app   app/.env: VITE_API_URL=http://localhost:3000
cd ../app
npm install
npm run dev          # Vite + Electron (RENDERER_PORT=5199 npm run dev if 5173 is taken)

The API's CORS_URLS must include the renderer dev origin (e.g. http://localhost:5173). Packaged builds use the app://devstation origin, which the API allows by default.

Build & package

cd app
npm run build        # typecheck + renderer (dist/) + Electron main/preload (dist-electron/)
npm run dist         # installer via electron-builder (release/); npm run dist:dir for an unpacked build

Set VITE_API_URL (e.g. in app/.env.production) before packaging  it is compiled into the renderer.

cd api
npm run build && npm run start:prod    # node dist/src/main
npm run migrate:prod                   # prisma migrate deploy with .env.production

Configuration

Where	Variable	Purpose
api	DATABASE_URL, JWT_SECRET, JWT_EXPIRATION_TIME	Required
api	CORS_URLS, APP_URL	Allowed renderer origins (dev)
api	COMPOSIO_API_KEY	Enables GitHub / Linear / Notion connections
api	COMPOSIO_AUTH_CONFIG_GITHUB/LINEAR/NOTION	Optional: reuse existing Composio auth configs (otherwise Composio-managed ones are created)
api	COMPOSIO_CALLBACK_URL	Optional OAuth return URL
api	RESEND_API_KEY	Optional: emails invitation codes
app	VITE_API_URL	API base URL

Device-only settings (workspace folder, shell, agent/editor executables, local project paths, approved custom commands) live in the Electron user-data folder (workspace.json); the session token is encrypted with the OS keychain (safeStorage). Nothing device-local is sent to the API.

Security model (Electron)

Context isolation + sandboxed renderer with no Node integration; a typed preload bridge is the only surface; every IPC payload is validated with zod in the main process; filesystem paths are confined to the project root; Git runs as git + argument arrays; service commands are built from detected package.json scripts, and any free-form command must be approved once per device; destructive Git operations require an explicit confirmation flag; navigation and new windows are locked to the app origin.