rz

Universal messaging for AI agents. If it runs in a terminal, it can talk. If it speaks HTTP, it can too.

Works with any AI coding agent — Claude Code, Gemini CLI, OpenCode, HTTP APIs, or any process. No SDK, no framework — just a CLI.

• rz run — start an agent (auto-detects tmux/cmux/zellij, or headless PTY)
• rz agent — wrap any command in a PTY, works in any terminal
• rz bridge — connect HTTP services as agents (no rz install needed on their side)
• rz send — message any agent, anywhere

Connect agents across machines with NATS (export RZ_HUB=nats://...).

Fork of rz by @HodlOg.

Install

cargo install rz-agent

From source:

git clone https://github.com/iliasoroka1/rz
cd rz
make install

Quick start

Terminal agents

# Start NATS (one-time)
nats-server -js
export RZ_HUB=nats://localhost:4222

# Run agents
rz run --name worker claude --dangerously-skip-permissions
rz run --name reviewer gemini

# Send messages
rz send worker "refactor the auth module"
rz ps

HTTP agents

Any HTTP service can be an rz agent through the bridge — no rz install needed on the service side:

# Start a bridge for your HTTP service
rz bridge --name api-bot --webhook http://localhost:7070/inbox --port 7071

The bridge does two things:

Inbound — messages from other agents arrive as POST to your webhook:

{"id":"a1b2","from":"worker","text":"process this data","ts":1774568000}

Outbound — your service sends messages by POSTing to the bridge:

curl -X POST http://localhost:7071/send \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"to":"worker","text":"here are the results"}'

That's it. Your HTTP service is now a full rz agent — discoverable, messageable, and connected to every other agent on the NATS hub.

Permanent agents

For long-running agents that should survive restarts and receive offline messages:

rz agent --name server-worker --permanent -- claude --dangerously-skip-permissions
rz bridge --name api-bot --permanent --webhook http://localhost:7070/inbox

JetStream stores messages while the agent is offline. On restart with the same name, it picks up where it left off.

Cross-machine

Agents on different machines, different multiplexers, different languages — all talk through NATS:

# Machine A (tmux) — terminal agent
export RZ_HUB=nats://nats.example.com:4222
rz run --name worker claude --dangerously-skip-permissions

# Machine B (plain terminal) — another terminal agent
export RZ_HUB=nats://nats.example.com:4222
rz agent --name reviewer -- gemini

# Machine C — HTTP service via bridge
export RZ_HUB=nats://nats.example.com:4222
rz bridge --name api-bot --webhook http://localhost:7070/inbox

# Any machine — send to any agent
rz send worker "implement feature X"
rz send api-bot "process batch 42"

How it works

Every message is a single line: @@RZ:<json>

{"id":"a1b2","from":"lead","to":"worker","kind":{"kind":"chat","body":{"text":"do X"}},"ts":1774488000}

Registry

Agents register in two places:

• NATS KV (rz-agents bucket) — global, real-time discovery
• Local file (~/.rz/registry.json) — fallback when NATS is unavailable

Temporary agents are pruned after 10 minutes of inactivity. Permanent agents (--permanent) persist until explicitly removed.

Message kinds

Backends

Commands

Run agents

Messaging

Observe

Registry

Use rz help <command> for details. rz help --all shows all commands.

Project structure

rz/
├── crates/
│   ├── rz-protocol/        # @@RZ: wire format
│   ├── rz-cli/
│   │   ├── main.rs           # CLI + auto-detect backend
│   │   ├── backend.rs        # Backend trait (Cmux, Zellij, Tmux)
│   │   ├── pty.rs            # PTY agent wrapper
│   │   ├── bridge.rs         # HTTP-to-NATS bridge
│   │   ├── tmux.rs           # tmux CLI wrapper
│   │   ├── cmux.rs           # cmux socket client
│   │   ├── zellij.rs         # zellij CLI wrapper
│   │   ├── nats_hub.rs       # NATS (JetStream + core)
│   │   ├── registry.rs       # Local + NATS KV registry
│   │   ├── mailbox.rs        # File-based message store
│   │   ├── bootstrap.rs      # Agent bootstrap message
│   │   └── log.rs            # @@RZ: message extraction
│   └── rz-hub/               # Zellij WASM plugin (optional)
└── Makefile

Built by agents, for agents

Most of this codebase was written by AI agents using rz to coordinate. The tmux backend, Backend trait, PTY agent, NATS KV registry, and HTTP bridge were all implemented by Claude Code agents spawned via rz run, communicating through rz send, and reporting back to a lead agent. The tool was tested and debugged by the same agents that built it.

Credits

Forked from rz by @HodlOg.

License

MIT OR Apache-2.0