Superego

A metacognitive advisor for AI coding assistants. Monitors conversations, evaluates the assistant's approach, and provides feedback before finishing.

Supported platforms:

• Claude Code - Full support via plugin
• OpenCode - Alpha support via TypeScript plugin (see opencode-plugin/)

What It Does

When you use Claude Code (or OpenCode) with superego enabled:

1. Session starts - Claude is told superego is active and to take feedback seriously
2. Claude works - You interact normally with Claude
3. Before large edits - Superego evaluates proposed changes in context (Edit/Write over 20 lines)
4. Before Claude finishes - Superego evaluates the full conversation
5. If concerns found - Claude is blocked and shown the feedback
6. Claude continues - Incorporates feedback, may ask you clarifying questions
7. Clean exit - Once addressed (or no concerns), Claude finishes normally

This creates feedback loops where Claude can course-correct both during work and before presenting results.

Quickstart

# 1. Install the Claude Code plugin
/plugin marketplace add cloud-atlas-ai/superego
/plugin install superego@superego

# 2. Initialize in your project (installs binary if needed)
/superego:init

That's it. The /superego:init command detects if the binary is missing and offers to install it via Homebrew or Cargo.

Slash Commands

Manual Installation

If you prefer to install the binary manually:

Homebrew (macOS):

brew install cloud-atlas-ai/superego/superego

Cargo (cross-platform):

cargo install superego

From source:

git clone https://github.com/cloud-atlas-ai/superego.git
cd superego
cargo install --path .

Then run sg init in your project to create the .superego/ configuration.

Plugin Installation Details

Claude Code uses a marketplace system for plugins. The superego plugin contains hook scripts that run automatically.

From GitHub (recommended):

/plugin marketplace add cloud-atlas-ai/superego
/plugin install superego@superego

From a local clone (for development):

/plugin marketplace add /absolute/path/to/superego
/plugin install superego@superego

The plugin includes:

• hooks/hooks.json - Defines which events trigger superego
• scripts/*.sh - Hook scripts that call the sg binary
• commands/*.md - Slash commands for superego management

What You'll See

When superego has feedback, Claude will continue working instead of stopping, addressing concerns like:

• Scope drift from the current task
• Missing error handling or edge cases
• Approaches that don't align with project conventions
• Incomplete implementations

If Claude disagrees with non-trivial feedback, it will escalate to you for a decision.

Debugging

Check if hooks are firing

tail -f .superego/hook.log

You'll see:

[15:42:01] Hook fired
[15:42:01] Running: sg evaluate-llm
[15:42:03] Evaluation complete
[15:42:03] Blocking with feedback: Consider error handling...

Check superego state

cat .superego/state.json        # Last evaluation timestamp
cat .superego/feedback          # Pending feedback (if any)
ls .superego/decisions/         # Audit trail of all feedback

Manual evaluation

sg evaluate-llm --transcript-path ~/.claude/projects/<project>/transcript.jsonl

Reset everything

sg reset    # Removes .superego/ directory
sg init     # Fresh start

Migrating from legacy hooks

If you previously used sg init before v0.4.0 (which created .claude/hooks/superego/):

/plugin marketplace add cloud-atlas-ai/superego
/plugin install superego@superego
sg migrate  # Remove legacy hooks

Customization

Edit .superego/prompt.md to customize what superego evaluates:

• Add project-specific guidelines
• Adjust strictness
• Focus on particular concerns

Environment Variables

• SUPEREGO_DISABLED=1 - Disable superego entirely
• SUPEREGO_CHANGE_THRESHOLD=N - Lines required to trigger PreToolUse evaluation (default: 20)

How It Works

SessionStart hook
    └── Injects contract: "SUPEREGO ACTIVE: critically evaluate feedback..."

PreToolUse hook (before any tool)
    ├── Checks if periodic eval is due (time-based)
    ├── For Edit/Write: checks change size (lines added/modified)
    ├── If >= threshold (default 20): runs sg evaluate-llm with pending change
    ├── If concerns: returns {"decision":"block","reason":"SUPEREGO FEEDBACK: ..."}
    │   └── Claude sees feedback, reconsiders the change
    └── If small or clean: allows tool execution

Stop hook (when Claude tries to finish)
    ├── Runs sg evaluate-llm
    ├── Reads transcript since last evaluation
    ├── Sends to LLM with superego prompt
    ├── If concerns: returns {"decision":"block","reason":"SUPEREGO FEEDBACK: ..."}
    │   └── Claude sees feedback, continues working
    └── If clean: allows stop

PreCompact hook (before context truncation)
    └── Same as Stop - evaluates before transcript is lost

Commands

sg init              # Initialize superego (creates .superego/)
sg migrate           # Remove legacy hooks (for users upgrading from < v0.4.0)
sg reset             # Remove .superego/ directory
sg evaluate-llm      # Run LLM evaluation (called by hooks)
sg has-feedback      # Check for pending feedback (exit 0=yes, 1=no)
sg get-feedback      # Get and clear pending feedback
sg --version         # Show version

Requirements

• Claude Code CLI
• jq (for hook JSON parsing)
• Rust toolchain (to build from source) or Homebrew (for pre-built binary)

License

Source-available. See LICENSE for details.