This Is Fine

Let's turn up the heat!
v1.0.0 — production release. The house is still on fire. The coffee is excellent.

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This Is Fine (tif) is a local-first restraint system for coding agents. When your AI co-pilot decides the bugfix needs a new microservice, three abstraction layers, and a dependency on left-pad-redux, This Is Fine is the calm dog who says: maybe just fix the null check.

It applies controlled pressure, measurable containment policies, and verified simplification so you get the smallest correct implementation — not the smallest interesting one.

Minimalism is bounded by a non-negotiable correctness floor.
A smaller wrong answer can never beat a larger right one.
We will not ship vibes.

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Why this exists

Coding agents are great at adding. They are… less great at stopping.

This Is Fine sits next to your agent (Claude Code, Codex, Gemini CLI, OpenCode, or anything that speaks JSON) and:

1. Turns up the heat (Fire Levels 1–4) so the agent feels social pressure to stay small
2. Scores the damage (files, lines, deps, abstractions — Fuel Added)
3. Verifies the result still works
4. Runs a Firebreak if things go Out of Control (isolated simplify → re-verify → approve)
5. Escalates to Five-Alarm only after current containment has already failed (we do not open with the fire hose)

Everything stays on your machine. No cloud telemetry. No surprise model calls. Your secrets stay in your burning living room, where they belong.

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Install (no Rust required)

Pick your preferred level of firey goodness.

One-liner (recommended)

# Unix / macOS / WSL — installs latest release, verifies SHA-256 against SHA256SUMS
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/9thLevelSoftware/this-is-fine/main/scripts/install.sh | bash

# Windows PowerShell
irm https://raw.githubusercontent.com/9thLevelSoftware/this-is-fine/main/scripts/install.ps1 | iex

Pin a version:

./scripts/install.sh --version v1.0.0

.\scripts\install.ps1 -Version v1.0.0

Then confirm the dog is house-trained:

tif --version   # → tif 1.0.0

Prefer checkout-local install so SUMS helpers resolve offline-friendly: clone the repo, then ./scripts/install.sh --version v1.0.0.

From source (for people who want more fire)

cargo install --path crates/tif
# or
cargo build --release -p tif   # → target/release/tif

Requires Rust 1.75+. End users of release binaries need no Rust — we already suffered for you.

Uninstall (when the coffee runs out)

./scripts/uninstall.sh --prefix ~/.local
# optional: also purge credential secrets dirs
./scripts/uninstall.sh --prefix ~/.local --purge-secrets

.\scripts\uninstall.ps1 -PurgeSecrets

Release assets + checksums: GitHub Releases.

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60-second quick start

cd your-perfectly-normal-repo   # smoke optional

tif init          # lay down config + local state
tif on            # start containment (the dog sits down)
tif status        # how bad is it, really?

# Tell the agent (or yourself) what the policy wants
tif policy resolve --task "fix null pointer in parser"

# Agent adapters call this around real work
tif run begin --task "fix null pointer in parser" --agent claude-code --json

# …agent implements the tiniest correct fix…

tif run complete <run_id> --from-git --json --verification-passed true
tif assess --from-git
tif status --json

Suspend containment when you're deliberately exploring (yes, that's allowed):

tif off    # temporary leave of absence for the dog
tif on     # back to work

Interactive command center (keyboard: ↑↓ / 1-8 / r refresh / q quit):

tif tui

Full recovery runbook (dual-failure, hung verify, disk full): docs/user-guide.md.

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Agent adapters

Wire This Is Fine into a real agent product. Protocol smoke is not enough for glory — use the real host when you can.

Agent	Install
Claude Code	adapters/claude-code/install.sh / install.ps1
Codex	adapters/codex/install.sh / install.ps1
Gemini CLI	adapters/gemini-cli/install.sh / install.ps1
OpenCode	adapters/opencode/install.sh / install.ps1

Always pass --json. Refuse envelopes with unknown major protocol_version. Spec: docs/protocol/v1.md.

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Product vocabulary

Because "bloat" lacked panache.

Technical concept	Product term
Stress-prompt context	Pressure Scenario
Anti-bloat rules	Containment Policy
Aggressiveness	Fire Level
Repository discovery	Source Inspection
Diff and policy report	Damage Assessment
Automatic simplification	Firebreak
Avoidable additions	Fuel Added
Successful result	Contained
Excessive result	Out of Control
Emergency recovery	Five-Alarm

Fire Levels

Level	Name	Vibes
1	Ember	"Maybe we don't need a monorepo."
2	Smolder	Stronger YAGNI side-eye
3	Containment	Default. Guarded mode. Sip coffee.
4	Critical	Aggressive reduction. The dog is still smiling.
5	Five-Alarm	Escalation only after current-task containment failure. Not a lifestyle.

tif fire-level        # show
tif fire-level 4      # turn up the heat (1–4 operational)

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Configuration

File	Purpose
.this-is-fine.toml	Shared, committed repository policy
.this-is-fine.local.toml	Machine-local reviewers, credentials, endpoints (gitignored)
.this-is-fine/	Local SQLite audit DB and artifacts (your black box recorder)

Illustrative shared config:

version = 1
enabled = true
default_fire_level = 3

[verification]
commands = [
  "cargo fmt --check",
  "cargo clippy --all-targets --all-features -- -D warnings",
  "cargo test --all-features"
]

[simplicity.weights]
runtime_dependency = 100
new_file = 25
public_interface = 20
abstraction = 15
added_line = 1
unrelated_change = 50

[simplicity.limits]
new_runtime_dependencies = 0

[approval]
sensitive_paths = ["src/auth/**", "migrations/**"]

[audit]
tier = "redacted"   # metadata | redacted | full
max_age_days = 90
max_size_mb = 1024

[rollback]
max_days = 7
successful_commits = 3

Schema reference: docs/config/schema-v1.md.

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Correctness floor (the part that is not a joke)

• A smaller incorrect candidate can never defeat a larger correct candidate
• Adaptation cannot weaken the floor, sensitive-path rules, or required verification
• No unverified Firebreak may replace a known-good implementation
• Source egress only with explicit reviewer permission

If the house is on fire and the tests fail, we do not redecorate. We put the fire out.

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CLI cheat sheet

tif init | on | off | status
tif inspect
tif policy resolve [--task …] [--fire-level N] [--json]
tif run begin|complete|show|status
tif assess [--from-git] [--files-changed N] [--lines-added N] [--deps-added N]
tif verify [--dry-run]
tif firebreak [--run-id …] [--candidate PATH] [--apply]
tif fire-level [1-4]
tif rollback <run_id>
tif audit show | --gc | --purge
tif five-alarm --plan | --run <run_id> [--apply]
tif adaptation status | recommend | reset
tif tui

Add --json for the adapter protocol.

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What you get in v1.0

• Rust core + tif CLI (JSON protocol for agents)
• Firebreak closed loop with user-authorized reviewers (isolation + re-verify + approval)
• Five-Alarm staged recovery after current containment failure
• Production TUI — live events, approve/reject, probe, audit filter
• Adapters for Claude Code, Codex, Gemini CLI, OpenCode (Unix + Windows)
• Install scripts with SHA-256 SUMS verification; multi-OS release assets
• Audit store: SQLite + content-addressed artifacts (local only)
• CI templates (GitHub Actions / GitLab) — read-only by default

Field evidence and readiness: docs/V1_READINESS.md.

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Architecture (for the curious)

crates/tif-core   # domain library (+ provider feature flags)
crates/tif        # CLI + TUI binary
crates/tif-e2e    # field-validation battery
adapters/         # installable agent adapters
ci/               # consumer-repo CI templates
docs/             # design, protocol, security, readiness

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Privacy

• No cloud telemetry
• No unauthorized hosted models
• Audit data stays under .this-is-fine/
• Reviewers only from the user-authorized local pool

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Support / when it is not fine

Owner: 9thLevelSoftware maintainers.

1. Recovery runbook → docs/user-guide.md
2. Open a GitHub issue with label incident (or P0 for data loss / silent bad apply)
3. Attach redacted tif audit --json, OS, and tif --version when possible

Best-effort community support. Not a 24×7 fire department.

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Development

cargo fmt
cargo clippy --workspace --all-targets -- -D warnings
cargo test --workspace

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Documentation

Doc	Description
User guide	Install, adapters, recovery
V1 readiness	Must/Should checklist + evidence
Protocol v1	Adapter JSON contract
Config schema v1	Configuration reference
Threat model	Security boundaries
Versioning	SemVer / schema / protocol
Adapters	Agent install + troubleshooting
Design specification	Full product design
Changelog	Release notes
Roadmap	Phases 0–10

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License

MIT OR Apache-2.0

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This is fine.
_{Please verify your Firebreak candidates. The dog is not a unit test.}