Cabinet — Free & Open-Source AI-First Knowledge Base

# Cabinet — Free & Open-Source AI-First Knowledge Base [Cabinet](https://runcabinet.com/#) [Features](https://runcabinet.com/#features)[Why Now](https://runcabinet.com/#karpathy)[Compare](https://runcabinet.com/#compare)[AI Agents](https://runcabinet.com/#agents)[In the Wild](https://runcabinet.com/media) [Star Cabinet Star on GitHub](https://github.com/hilash/cabinet)[Discord](https://discord.gg/hJa5TRTbTH) free project · open source · self-hosted # cabinet /ˈkab.ɪ.nət/ noun 1. 1.A cupboard with shelves or drawers for storing or displaying items. “a filing cabinet” 2. 2.politics The committee of senior ministers responsible for controlling government policy. “a cabinet meeting” 3. 3.software An AI-first knowledge base where files live on disk and a team of AI agents helps you execute. “I asked my cabinet to research the market and draft the blog post” origin — mid 16th century: from cabinet, diminutive of Old French cabine. definition 3— 2026, open source. Download for Mac or $npx cabinetai run ## Your knowledge base. Your AI team.  A free and open-source AI-first startup OS where everything lives as markdown files on disk. No database. No vendor lock-in. No subscription. No trial. No paywall. Clone it, run it, and make it your own. | Markdown on disk Self-hosted Git-backed AI-native Open source Real Use Cases ## How people actually use Cabinet Knowledge base + agents + files. One OS for wildly different workflows. 🚀 Startup OS Solo Founder ### Strategy, roadmap, market — one place. “I run my entire startup from here. Strategy in /strategy/, roadmap in /product/roadmap.md, ICP in /market/icp.md. My CEO agent attends every planning session — I open a page, describe the week, and it challenges my assumptions and updates the mission board.” Activity — last 24h Cabinet/my-startup 🚀my-startup Agents 🎯CEO Agent 📊Market Scout ✅OKR Tracker Files strategy/ q2-plan vision product/ roadmap specs/ market/ icp competitors updated tools/ okr-tracker/ Q2 Plan — 2026 Reviewed by CEO Agent · today · 3 open questions flagged North Star OKRs growth retention Q2-2026 fundraising 📱 B2C App Indie App Founder ### My app runs itself while I sleep “I use it to run my B2C app. The App Store listing is a markdown page I can update any time. I have an hourly Reddit scout that surfaces user complaints, and a weekly competitor job that crawls the market and dumps everything into /market/competitors/. I wake up to a briefing.” Activity — last 24h Cabinet/my-b2c-app 📱my-b2c-app Agents 🔍Reddit Scout 📊Competitor Analyst 📝Content Writer Files product/ app-store-listing roadmap pricing market/ competitors/ week-14 new week-13 positioning data/ analytics.csv reviews.csv App Store Listing Updated by Content Writer · 2 hours ago Short Description Keywords b2c productivity ios mobile startup What's New in v4.2 💼 B2B Sales Small Business Owner ### 2,000 leads. One army of agents. “I have a CSV of leads. My agents read it, research each company, and draft personalised outreach. The pipeline CSV updates in real time — I watch it fill up from my dashboard. It's like having a sales team that never sleeps and never asks for a raise.” Activity — last 24h Cabinet/acme-sales 💼acme-sales Agents 🕵️Lead Researcher ✉️Outreach Writer 📈Pipeline Tracker Files leads/ pipeline.csv leads-raw.csv intel/ companies/ techcorp new globex outreach/ templates/ cold-email follow-up tools/ pipeline-dashboard/ pipeline.csv 87 rows · Updated by Lead Researcher · just now Company Contact Status Score TechCorp Inc Alice Chen ✅ Researched 87 StartupXYZ Bob Lee 📝 Drafted 72 GlobalDev Carol Kim 📤 Sent 91 NewCo Ltd Dan Park 🔍 Researching… — ✍️ Newsletter Solo Creator ### Monday morning. Newsletter writes itself. “Every Monday my Trend Scout scans HN and Reddit, picks the top signals, and my Draft Writer assembles the issue. I open Cabinet, read the draft, make a few edits, and hit send. What used to take 3 hours now takes 10 minutes.” Activity — last 24h Cabinet/my-newsletter ✍️my-newsletter Agents 📡Trend Scout 🖊️Draft Writer 🔎SEO Reviewer Files newsletter/ issues/ 2026-w14 new 2026-w13 2026-w12 brand/ voice-guide tone-examples research/ sources hn-picks updated archive/ Week 14 — The AI Stack Shift Drafted by Draft Writer · Monday 8:14am · ready for review This week's signal Top picks AI tooling indie hackers dev tools 🏢 Consulting Freelance Consultant ### Every client. One brain. “Each client gets their own folder. Meeting notes, proposals, deliverables — all markdown. When I switch clients, I just ask the AI about the folder. It has full context: the history, the decisions, the open questions. No re-reading, no catch-up.” Activity — last 24h Cabinet/consulting-kb 🏢consulting-kb Agents 🗒️Meeting Summariser 📄Proposal Writer 🔗Research Assistant Files clients/ acme/ strategy proposal-v2 meeting-notes/ 2026-03-28 2026-03-14 globex/ proposal-v3 updated brief templates/ proposal discovery Acme — Q2 Strategy Updated after kickoff call · 3 days ago Current Focus Open Questions Next Steps ⚙️ Open Source OSS Maintainer ### Merge PR. Changelog writes itself. “I linked my GitHub repo with .repo.yaml. When I merge a PR, an agent reads the diff, updates CHANGELOG.md, drafts release notes, and queues a Discord announcement. Maintenance overhead dropped to almost zero.” Activity — last 24h Cabinet/my-oss-lib ⚙️my-oss-lib Agents 📋Release Writer 📖Docs Updater 📣Announcer Files docs/ getting-started api-reference contributing changelog updated releases/ v2.1.0 new v2.0.0 .repo.yaml Changelog Written by Release Writer · just now · linked to github/my-lib v2.1.0 — 2026-04-02 v2.0.0 — 2026-03-15 🚀 Startup OS Solo Founder ### Strategy, roadmap, market — one place. “I run my entire startup from here. Strategy in /strategy/, roadmap in /product/roadmap.md, ICP in /market/icp.md. My CEO agent attends every planning session — I open a page, describe the week, and it challenges my assumptions and updates the mission board.” Activity — last 24h Cabinet/my-startup 🚀my-startup Agents 🎯CEO Agent 📊Market Scout ✅OKR Tracker Files strategy/ q2-plan vision product/ roadmap specs/ market/ icp competitors updated tools/ okr-tracker/ Q2 Plan — 2026 Reviewed by CEO Agent · today · 3 open questions flagged North Star OKRs growth retention Q2-2026 fundraising 📱 B2C App Indie App Founder ### My app runs itself while I sleep “I use it to run my B2C app. The App Store listing is a markdown page I can update any time. I have an hourly Reddit scout that surfaces user complaints, and a weekly competitor job that crawls the market and dumps everything into /market/competitors/. I wake up to a briefing.” Activity — last 24h Cabinet/my-b2c-app 📱my-b2c-app Agents 🔍Reddit Scout 📊Competitor Analyst 📝Content Writer Files product/ app-store-listing roadmap pricing market/ competitors/ week-14 new week-13 positioning data/ analytics.csv reviews.csv App Store Listing Updated by Content Writer · 2 hours ago Short Description Keywords b2c productivity ios mobile startup What's New in v4.2 B2C App B2B Sales Newsletter Consulting Open Source Startup OS ☁️ ☁️ ☁️ ☁️ Install Flow ## See Cabinet start up in the terminal The install walkthrough is back. One command scaffolds the workspace, sets up your AI team, and gets Cabinet running locally. cabinet ~ zsh [Install Cabinet](https://runcabinet.com/#get-started) The Problem ## Your AI agents have no memory Every time you start a new Claude session, it forgets everything. Your project context, your decisions, your research — gone. You keep re-explaining the same things. Cabinet gives your AI a persistent brain: a knowledge base that both you and your agents read and write to, 24/7. ### Without Cabinet Scattered docs in Notion. AI sessions that forget context. Manual copy-paste between tools. Scripts held together with tape.  ### With Cabinet One knowledge base. AI agents that remember everything. Scheduled jobs that compound. Your team grows while you sleep. ### Design Principle If it feels like enterprise workflow software, it's wrong. If it feels like watching a team work, it's right. Unique to Cabinet ## Ship HTML apps inside your knowledge base This is the biggest difference between Cabinet and tools like Obsidian or Notion. Drop an`index.html`into any folder and it renders as a live, interactive app. * **Full-screen mode:** add a `.app` marker — sidebar and AI panel auto-collapse * **AI-generated apps:** ask Claude to build a dashboard, it writes the HTML directly into your KB * **Version controlled:** every change is tracked in git, same as your markdown pages * **No build step:** plain HTML/CSS/JS. Works with React, Vue, or vanilla /tools/lead-scorer/index.html <!-- Your KB file tree --> data/ tools/ lead-scorer/ index.html ← renders as app .app ← full-screen mode styles.css app.js dashboards/ metrics/ index.html ← embedded site research/ market-analysis.md whitepaper.pdf leads.csv Features ## Everything you need. Nothing you don't. A complete operating system for your startup — knowledge base, AI agents, task management, and team chat in one self-hosted app. ### WYSIWYG + Markdown Rich text editing with Tiptap. Tables, code blocks, slash commands. Toggle to raw markdown anytime. ### AI Agents Onboard a CEO, Editor, Marketer. Each has goals, skills, scheduled jobs. Watch them work like a real team. ### Embedded HTML Apps Drop an index.html in any folder — it renders as an iframe. Full-screen mode for dashboards and tools. ### Web Terminal Full Claude Code terminal in the browser. xterm.js + node-pty. Run commands without leaving Cabinet. ### File-Based Everything No database. Markdown on disk. Drag-and-drop tree sidebar. Your data is always yours, always portable. ### Git-Backed History Every save auto-commits. Full diff viewer. Restore any page to any point in time. Linked repo support. ### Scheduled Jobs Cron-based agent automation. Reddit scout every 6 hours. Weekly reports on Monday. Your AI team never sleeps. ### Missions & Tasks Break goals into missions. Assign tasks to agents. Track progress with Kanban boards and progress bars. ### Internal Chat Built-in team channels. Agents and humans communicate. @mention an agent to trigger a response. ### Full-Text Search Cmd+K instant search across all pages. Fuzzy matching. FlexSearch index rebuilt on every change. ### PDF & CSV First-Class PDFs render inline. CSVs open as editable tables with add/delete rows and columns. Auto-save with git commit. ### Linked Git Repos Add .repo.yaml to link KB directories to source code repos. AI agents read and reference your codebase. The Shift ## Why the world needs Cabinet Andrej Karpathy recently described the future of knowledge work. Cabinet is that future, built today. AK Andrej Karpathy LLM Knowledge Bases “Using LLMs to build personal knowledge bases for various topics of research interest. A large fraction of my recent token throughput is going less into manipulating code, and more into manipulating knowledge.” “Raw data from a given number of sources is collected, then compiled by an LLM into a .md wiki, then operated on by various CLIs by the LLM to do Q&A and to incrementally enhance the wiki.” “I think there is room here for an incredible new product instead of a hacky collection of scripts.” Data Ingest Karpathy: Index source docs into raw/, LLM compiles a wiki of .md files Drag PDFs, CSVs, HTML apps, markdown into the KB. AI agents auto-organize and cross-link. IDE / Viewer Karpathy: Uses Obsidian as the frontend to view compiled wiki Built-in WYSIWYG editor, PDF viewer, CSV editor, embedded HTML apps, web terminal - all in one UI. Q&A Karpathy: Once wiki is big enough, ask LLM complex questions against it AI panel with @mentions. Agents reference the entire KB. Ask questions, get answers with page citations. Output Karpathy: Render markdown, slide shows, matplotlib images back into Obsidian Agents write directly to the KB. Slides, dashboards, reports - all viewable inline. Output compounds. Automation Karpathy: Manually runs LLM health checks, vibe-coded a search engine Scheduled cron jobs, agent heartbeats, mission boards. Your AI team runs 24/7 without scripts. Comparison ## Not another note-taking app Obsidian is a markdown editor. Notion is a team wiki. Paperclip orchestrates agents. Cabinet is the only tool that combines a knowledge base, AI agents, and embedded apps in one self-hosted OS. | Feature | Cabinet | Obsidian | Notion | Paperclip | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | Knowledge base / wiki | | | | | | Markdown files on disk | | | | | | Self-hosted / local-first | | | | | | AI agent orchestration | | | | | | Agent org chart / hierarchy | | | | | | Agent heartbeats / scheduling | | | | | | Agent budget controls | | | | | | Embedded HTML apps | | | | | | Web terminal (xterm.js) | | | | | | WYSIWYG editor | | | | | | PDF / CSV viewing & editing | | | | | | Git-backed version history | | | | | | Internal team chat | | | | | | Mission / task system | | | | | | Linked Git repos | | | | | | Audit logs | | | | | | No database required | | | | | ### vs Obsidian Obsidian is a great markdown editor with plugins. But it has no AI agents, no scheduled jobs, no embedded HTML apps, no web terminal. Cabinet is a knowledge OS, not just a note editor. ### vs Notion Notion locks your data in their cloud. Cabinet stores everything as markdown files on disk. You own your data. You can grep it. AI agents read and write directly. No API limits. No lock-in. ### vs Paperclip Paperclip is excellent at agent orchestration — org charts, budgets, audit logs. But it has no knowledge base, no editor, no content layer. Cabinet gives your agents a brain to read and write to, plus HTML apps, a terminal, and a full wiki. AI Team ## Hire your AI team in 5 questions Answer 5 questions. A CEO agent appears. It suggests teammates. Each agent has goals, skills, and recurring jobs. You watch them work like watching a real team. 🎯 CEO Agent Lead Strategic planning, goal tracking, task delegation. Creates missions, coordinates the team. Weekly report Goal review 📝 Editor Specialist KB content editing, formatting, linking. Maintains documentation quality. Content review Link checker 📣 Content Marketer Specialist Blog posts, social media, newsletters. SEO-optimized content generation. Reddit scout Blog drafts 🔍 SEO Specialist Specialist Keyword research, site optimization, ranking analysis. Keyword tracker Competitor scan 💰 Sales Agent Specialist Lead generation, outreach, pipeline tracking. Lead scorer Follow-up drafter 🧪 QA Agent Specialist Review, proofread, fact-check content across the KB. Content audit Broken link scan How It Works ## From zero to AI team in 2 minutes 01 ### Install & Run One command. Next.js + daemon start. Your knowledge base is a /data directory on disk. `npx cabinetai run` 02 ### Answer 5 Questions What's your company? What do you do? What are your goals? Cabinet builds your custom AI team. 03 ### Watch Your Team Work Agents create missions, write content, scout Reddit, review quality — all on schedule. 04 ### Knowledge Compounds Every agent run, every edit, every research session adds to the KB. Your system gets smarter every day.  ## Ready to build your AI team? Cabinet is a free, open-source project you can run yourself. No subscription, no trial clock, and no vendor lock-in. Start in 2 minutes. Download for Mac or $npx cabinetai run [Join Discord](https://discord.gg/hJa5TRTbTH)[Star Cabinet on GitHub Star on GitHub](https://github.com/hilash/cabinet) Questions? [hi@runcabinet.com](mailto:hi@runcabinet.com) #### Product * [Features](https://runcabinet.com/#features) * [AI Agents](https://runcabinet.com/#agents) * [Compare](https://runcabinet.com/#compare) #### Developers * [GitHub](https://github.com/hilash/cabinet) * [Documentation](https://github.com/hilash/cabinet#readme) * [Issues](https://github.com/hilash/cabinet/issues) #### Resources * [Why Now](https://runcabinet.com/#karpathy) * [License](https://github.com/hilash/cabinet/blob/main/LICENSE) #### Contact * [hi@runcabinet.com](mailto:hi@runcabinet.com) * [Join Discord](https://discord.gg/hJa5TRTbTH) * [hilash/cabinet](https://github.com/hilash/cabinet) Cabinet·Free project · Open source · MIT License Humans define intent. Agents do the work. The knowledge base is the shared memory.