A multitasking terminal for VS Code and the desktop — a real tiling layout, tmux keybindings, full mouse support, browser panes your agents can drive, and alerts that tell you when something needs you.
Try it
Documentation
- CLI reference — every
dor command
- Compatible agents — conversation recovery, watching, and contributing an agent integration
- Agent skill — the operating guide Dormouse bundles for coding agents
- Self-host — run the coordinating Relay on your own tailnet
- Hosted — the Hosted Relay and Natural Voice, from $10 a month
- Security — what Dormouse guarantees, what it does not, and how that is checked
Features
- Alerts when something needs you. Terminal notification protocols (
BEL, OSC 9/9;4/99/777) and unattended command exits alert with no setup; supported agents are watched by default when no watch list has been saved, and you can watch other command names to be alerted when they go quiet.
- tmux-compatible keybindings. Same prefix, same splits, same pane navigation. Muscle memory transfers.
- Full mouse support. Click to split, drag to resize, scroll to navigate. Or stay on the keyboard.
- Copy-paste that works. Click and drag selects text the way you'd expect, even in mouse-aware TUIs that normally swallow it as escape codes.
- Minimize to doors. Minimize a terminal to a compact status indicator. It keeps running and keeps reporting whether its task needs attention.
- Browser panes. Put a browser in the tiling layout next to the terminal serving it, drivable by you or your agents.
- Dual distribution. Standalone desktop app (Mac/Windows/Linux) or VS Code extension.
Development
This project uses pnpm, react, typescript, vite, tailwind, storybook, and xterm.js. The standalone app is built with Tauri.
The terminal is currently hosted by node-pty, but we plan on switching to a Rust backend for the PTY.
Quickstart
pnpm install
pnpm dev:website # vite hotreload at http://localhost:5173
pnpm dev:standalone # tauri hotreload
pnpm dev:relay # selfhost Relay + Pocket, for remote control
pnpm dogfood:vscode # builds the VSCode extension and installs it into your local VSCode
pnpm dogfood:standalone # installs your local build overtop of your existing system installation (then `dor app restart`)
pnpm dogfood:standalone --no-install # builds and runs the standalone app from the build dir, without installing
pnpm storybook # http://localhost:6006
pnpm test # runs all tests (spec lint first)
pnpm lint:specs # docs/specs conventions only
Folder structure
| Path | Description |
|---|
lib/ | Shared React terminal library, plus the remote/Pocket modules |
website/ | dormouse.sh — marketing, playground, and the generated docs pages |
standalone/ | Tauri desktop app and its Node PTY sidecar |
vscode-ext/ | VS Code extension (the README there is the canonical product guide) |
relay/ | Selfhost coordinating Relay for remote control |
dor/ | The dor CLI staged onto every Dormouse terminal's PATH |
docs/specs/ | Internal specs — the reference for how everything actually behaves |
Agent strategy
This project was built with a combination of Claude, Codex, and Devin. We make heavy use of the impeccable.style agent skill, we recommend having it installed. See AGENTS.md for more detail.
License
FSL-1.1-MIT — Copyright 2026 DiffPlug LLC
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