Harness commands - Voss Docs

Voss uses one binary with three command families:

Harness commands for single-agent natural-language work
Compiler commands for .voss programs
Orchestration commands for team runs — see Orchestration and the CLI reference

Harness commands

Command	Purpose	Default mode
`voss`	Open the Go terminal client; falls back to `voss chat` when the binary is missing	`plan`
`voss ui`	Launch the Go terminal client explicitly (`voss ui resume <id>`, `voss ui --auth codex`)	`plan`
`voss chat`	Plain line-by-line REPL	`plan`
`voss do "<task>"`	Run one task and exit	`plan`
`voss edit <path>`	Start a scoped edit session	`edit`
`voss recall <query>`	Search code and project memory together	n/a
`voss sync`	Generate or update project workflow docs and managed instruction sections	n/a
`voss doctor`	Diagnose provider, config, compiler, and tool setup	n/a
`voss login` / `voss logout`	Sign in with Claude, Codex, or an API key; remove a stored key	n/a
`voss mcp list`	List MCP servers discovered from Claude, Codex, and Voss config	n/a
`voss skills`	List skills discovered from Claude, Codex, and Voss skill folders	n/a
`voss instructions show`	Show the `AGENTS.md` / `CLAUDE.md` bundle injected into runs	n/a
`voss tools`	List tool registry entries and mutability	n/a
`voss config`	Open or show harness configuration	n/a
`voss sessions`	List saved sessions	n/a
`voss resume <id>`	Resume a prior session by id prefix or name	session mode
`voss judge review`	Check work against acceptance criteria with Jev (advisory, opt-in)	n/a
`voss serve`	Run the local REST + SSE server used by the Go client and SDKs	n/a

Compiler commands

Command	Purpose
`voss check <path>`	Check `.voss` files without running them
`voss compile <file.voss>`	Emit readable Python
`voss run <file.voss>`	Compile and execute a `.voss` program
`voss init <name>`	Scaffold a Voss project
`voss ast <file.voss>`	Print parser output for debugging

voss run is not an agent command. Natural-language tasks use voss do.

Orchestration commands

For multi-agent team runs — full detail in Orchestration.

Command	Purpose
`voss team check`	Validate the team cage (roster, scope, budget, tools)
`voss team run "<goal>"`	Run a goal as a reviewed team
`voss board`	Render the board read-only from persisted nodes
`voss review`	Show per-card Reviewer-A + Reviewer-B verdicts
`voss audit`	Render the full read-only audit for a run
`voss session tree <root_id>`	Inspect per-agent budget, scope, and status
`voss capabilities list`	List the capability registry
`voss principles show`	Show the active engineering principles

Go terminal client

Bare voss opens a full-screen terminal client that runs the harness through voss serve. Set VOSS_USE_TUI=0 to get the plain chat instead. Slash commands it handles directly:

Command	Purpose
`/resume [id-or-name]`	Pick or resume a saved session
`/save-session [name]`	Save or rename the conversation
`/clear`	Drop active conversation memory; the transcript stays visible
`/memory`, `/recall <query>`	Summarize or search project memory
`/save <note>`, `/forget <pattern> --yes`	Retain or forget memory notes
`/model`, `/auth`	Pick a model or switch between Claude, Codex, and API auth
`/tools`, `/skills`, `/agents`	List tools (including MCP), skills, and subagents
`/symbol <name>`, `/refs <name>`, `/refresh`	Look up definitions and references; rebuild the code index
`/probable`, `/btrace`	Inspect recorded decisions and per-iteration token cost
`/vdiff <file.voss>`	Show `.voss` source next to generated Python

Model and auth choices persist across launches. Commands the Go client does not handle are available in voss chat.

Common flows

voss doctor
voss
voss do "summarize this repo"
voss recall "where is retry backoff handled?"
voss sync --check
voss edit src/app.py
voss sessions
voss resume <session-id>