Introduction

# Castellan

Pressure wakes agents — multiplexer, dashboard, and episode flywheel in one binary.

Quickstart →

Install

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Alphabetsoup16/Castellan/main/install.sh | bash

Castellan is the coordination runtime for multi-agent AI systems. Agents deposit into a typed blackboard and a decaying pheromone field; a pressure scheduler wakes the next agent when dependency signals clear. That is stigmergy — coordination through the environment — and it replaces a chat-router tax with geometry you can log, replay, and evolve.

• Pressure wake — deterministic scheduling from substrate signals, not a manager model picking the next agent.
• Mux + dashboard — panes and the operator UI in one binary.
• Evolve + drift — episodes improve topology; gates keep changes honest.
• RAH depth-bounded — harness-in-harness recursion with topology binding, not opaque shell-outs.

Episode flywheel

flowchart LR
    RUN[castellan run] --> LOG[.castellan/episodes]
    LOG --> EVOLVE[castellan evolve]
    EVOLVE --> GATE[castellan drift-check]
    GATE --> RUN

    classDef runtime stroke:#0969da,stroke-width:2px
    classDef evolve stroke:#d97706,stroke-width:2px
    classDef gate stroke:#1a7f37,stroke-width:2px

    class RUN,LOG runtime
    class EVOLVE evolve
    class GATE gate

1. Run — castellan run (add --mux / --rlm when you want panes)
2. Log — episode JSON under .castellan/episodes/
3. Evolve — topology mutations from the corpus
4. Gate — castellan drift-check against the verification manifest

For agents

Paste this into an agent session before it drives Castellan:

Read https://castellan-docs.pages.dev/integrations/agent-guide.html
(or the mirrored agent-guide.md). Operate via multiplexer panes + substrate
tools — not agent-to-agent chat. Prefer castellan herd status and MCP tools.

Full conventions: Agent guide. Lexicon: Conventions.