Preface

DeepSeek Harness (DSH) adopts a plugin-based architecture, and its default console interface is usually quite basic. For developers who need to frequently check TRACE and JOBS status or manage multiple sessions, a lack of a visual interaction layer increases operational cost. dsh-phosphor provides a full-screen terminal user interface (TUI) by using React and Ink in a Cordis bundle plugin, addressing the need for a visual interaction layer in DSH.

What Is It

dsh-phosphor is a full-screen, matrix-style TUI frontend designed for DeepSeek Harness. It runs as a Cordis bundle plugin and aims to provide DSH with an immersive interaction experience. The project is maintained by yaotongsb and is licensed under the MIT License.

Core Features

The plugin mainly provides the following capabilities:

  • Full-screen TUI interface: Provides an immersive terminal operation experience.
  • Multi-theme support: Built-in matrix and terminal themes, switchable via command or configuration.
  • Sidebar panels: Supports TRACE, JOBS, and FILES sidebar panels for viewing Agent status and context.
  • Command system:
    • /help: View help.
    • /model: Model selector with input filtering.
    • /new: Create a new session (shortcut Ctrl+N).
    • /resume: Session resume selector.
    • /attach <path>: Attach an image to the next message (only png/jpeg/webp/gif are supported).
    • /settings: Runtime settings panel.
    • /theme matrix|terminal: Switch themes.
  • Configuration options: Supports configuring parameters such as theme, matrixRain (digital rain background), scanlines (scanline effect), and panelMode via cordis.patch.yml.

Installation and Enablement

Currently, the plugin is distributed as source code only and cannot be installed via the dsh plugin add github:... command. You need to place the DeepSeek Harness source code checkout and the plugin in the same parent directory.

  1. Prepare the environment: Ensure Node.js (>= 22.19 or >= 24) and pnpm are installed.
  2. Check out and build DSH:
    git clone https://github.com/deepseek-ai/deepseek-harness.git
    cd deepseek-harness && git checkout b150a551b8 && pnpm install && pnpm run build
  1. Check out the plugin:
    git clone https://github.com/yaotongsb/dsh-phosphor.git
    cd dsh-phosphor && pnpm install && pnpm build
  1. Register the plugin:
    Run the following commands, ensuring the relative paths are correct:
    cd ../deepseek-harness
    pnpm dsh plugin --profile tui add ../dsh-phosphor

Typical Usage

After starting the plugin, you can interact with it in the following ways:

  • Switch themes: Enter /theme matrix or /theme terminal.
  • Create a new session: Enter /new or press Ctrl+N.
  • Resume a session: Enter /resume, select with the keyboard, and press Enter.
  • Attach an image: Enter /attach <image path> (must be used with a vision-capable model).
  • View panels: When the input is empty, press Alt+T (TRACE), Alt+J (JOBS), or Alt+F (FILES) to open the corresponding sidebar.

Use Cases and Notes

  • Source dependency: You must manually check out the deepseek-harness source code. The plugin resolves dependencies via relative links, and both must be located in the same parent directory.
  • Version lock: It is strictly locked to dsh v0.1.1-rc.2. Upgrading the DSH main program may cause plugin malfunction or crashes until the plugin has an official release.
  • Development environment: The plugin was developed and tested on Windows Terminal. Compatibility with other terminals is unknown.
  • Image rendering: Terminal environments do not support rendering images. Attachments are displayed only as a placeholder (▣ name (W×H)).
  • Performance limitations: Resuming very long sessions may be slow, and the plugin automatically adjusts the background animation frame rate based on system load.
  • Archiving: V1 does not support unarchiving operations.

Brief Conclusion

dsh-phosphor provides DSH with a visual interaction layer, suitable for developers who are accustomed to terminal workflows and need rich status monitoring. Because it is currently distributed as source code only and depends on a specific version, carefully verify the environment configuration before use.

GitHub repository | plugin directory