zuckerman

zuckerman

Ultra-minimal personal AI agent: starts small, self-modifies its code live, adapts by writing exactly the code & features you need

Stars: 203

Visit
 screenshot

Zuckerman is an ultra-minimal personal AI agent that self-modifies its code live, adapts to user needs by writing code and features, and shares improvements with other agents. It aims to build a self-growing intelligence that can add tools, rewrite behavior, and extend core logic by editing its own files with almost no external code required. Zuckerman offers a collaborative ecosystem where agents propose and publish capabilities to a shared contribution site for others to discover, adopt, and evolve further.

README:

Zuckerman Logo

Zuckerman [WIP]

Sharing updates here: @ddzuckerman_ai

Ultra-minimal personal AI agent: starts small, self-modifies its code live, adapts by writing exactly the code & features you need (beyond just self-looping), improves instantly, and shares improvements with other agents.

The vision: Build a truly self-growing intelligence — one that can add tools, rewrite behavior, or extend its core logic by editing its own files — with almost no external code required. Agents propose and publish capabilities to a shared contribution site, letting others discover, adopt, and evolve them further.

Zuckerman Screenshot

Why Zuckerman Exists

OpenClaw exploded in popularity (100k+ GitHub stars in weeks) because it delivers real agentic power: it acts across your apps, remembers context, and gets things done. But that power comes with trade-offs — massive codebase, complex setup, steep learning curve, ongoing security discussions (prompt injection, privileged access), and constant updates that can overwhelm regular users.

Zuckerman takes the opposite path:

  • Ultra-minimal start — only the essentials, zero bloat
  • Full self-edit power — the agent can modify its own configuration, tools, prompts, personalities, and even core logic in plain text files
  • Instant evolution — changes hot-reload immediately (no rebuilds, restarts, or dev friction)
  • Collaborative growth — agents share useful edits/discoveries so the whole network levels up together

You get an approachable, customizable agent that literally grows by rewriting itself — powerful without the usual headaches.

Key Features

  • Minimal by design — starts with core essentials only
  • Real-time self-improvement — agent edits its own files (config, tools, behavior, code) and reloads instantly
  • Full runtime modification — tweak anything while the agent runs
  • Hot-reload everywhere — no restarts needed
  • Feature versioning — track and manage versions of agent capabilities and improvements
  • Collaborative ecosystem — share and adopt improvements via a contribution website
  • Multi-channel ready — Discord, Slack, Telegram, WhatsApp, WebChat + more
  • Voice support — TTS/STT with multiple providers
  • Security foundations — auth, policy engine, sandboxing (Docker), secret management
  • Multiple agents — run several with unique personalities/tools
  • Dual interfaces — CLI (power users) + Electron app (visual)
  • Calendar & scheduling — built-in time management
  • Activity view — comprehensive timeline tracking of agent runs, tool calls, conversations, messages, and calendar events with filtering and detailed metadata
  • Sleep mode — intelligent memory consolidation that processes, summarizes, and saves memories when context window reaches 80% capacity (inspired by human sleep)
  • Attention system — brain-inspired attention management with 5 subsystems (alerting, orienting, sustained, selective, executive) that track focus, detect urgency, and guide memory retrieval

Architecture (Three Layers)

Everything is plain-text configurable and instantly reloadable.

  • World (src/server/world/) — the lightweight OS layer
    Communication (messengers, gateway), Execution (processes, security), Runtime (agent factory), Config loader, Voice, System utils

  • Agents (src/server/agents/) — self-contained agent definitions
    Each folder = one agent (core modules, tools, conversations, identity)

  • Interfaces (src/clients/) — how you talk to it
    CLI + Electron/React app (chat, inspector, settings, onboarding)

Quick Start

# Clone and install
git clone https://github.com/zuckermanai/zuckerman.git
cd zuckerman
pnpm install

# Launch the Electron app (recommended for beginners)
pnpm run dev

Easy Onboarding

Easy Onboarding

For Tasks:

Click tags to check more tools for each tasks

For Jobs:

Alternative AI tools for zuckerman

Similar Open Source Tools

For similar tasks

For similar jobs