aion

Aion is an authenticated AI desktop app backed by a Next.js server. It combines an Electron + React client, Better Auth, PostgreSQL/Drizzle, multi-model chat, and optional web search in a single Turborepo workspace.

What It Does

• Chat from a desktop UI built with Electron, React 19, and TanStack Router
• Switch between models such as GPT-5, Claude Sonnet 4, and Gemini 2.5 Flash
• Route web-enabled queries through Perplexity Sonar
• Handle sign-up and sign-in with Better Auth
• Persist auth data in PostgreSQL through Drizzle ORM
• Expose a server-side chat API from a Next.js app
• Manage local MCP server config from the app settings screen

Monorepo Layout

apps/
├── desktop/  # Electron renderer + desktop shell
└── server/   # Next.js API, auth, and database layer

Requirements

• Node.js 20+
• pnpm 10+
• Docker, if you want to run PostgreSQL locally with the included compose file

Setup

1. Install dependencies:

pnpm install

2. Create local env files from the examples:

cp apps/server/.env.example apps/server/.env
cp apps/desktop/.env.example apps/desktop/.env

3. Fill in the required values:

• apps/server/.env
  • DATABASE_URL
  • CORS_ORIGIN
  • BETTER_AUTH_SECRET
  • BETTER_AUTH_URL
  • AI_GATEWAY_API_KEY
• apps/desktop/.env
  • VITE_SERVER_URL

4. Start PostgreSQL:

pnpm run db:start

5. Push the database schema:

pnpm run db:push

6. Start the workspace:

pnpm run dev

By default, the server runs on http://localhost:3000. Point VITE_SERVER_URL at that server for the desktop app.

Useful Commands

• pnpm run dev runs the whole workspace
• pnpm run dev:desktop starts only the Electron app
• pnpm run dev:server starts only the Next.js server
• pnpm run build builds all apps
• pnpm run check-types runs TypeScript checks across the monorepo
• pnpm run check runs Biome checks and formatting
• pnpm run db:start starts PostgreSQL with Docker Compose
• pnpm run db:stop stops the database container
• pnpm run db:down stops the database container and removes resources
• pnpm run db:push pushes the current Drizzle schema
• pnpm run db:studio opens Drizzle Studio

Stack

• Electron Forge
• React 19
• TanStack Router
• Next.js 15
• Better Auth
• Drizzle ORM
• PostgreSQL
• AI SDK
• Turborepo
• Tailwind CSS
• Biome