Set up your AI coding agent to write correct Phel. One command installs a per-tool skill file plus a shared docs tree into your project, so the agent knows Phel's syntax, idioms, and gotchas without crawling the web.
Two kinds of "AI" on this site. This page is about coding Phel with an agent. If instead you want to build AI features in Phel (LLM chat, embeddings, tool use), see the AI Module and the ai API.
One-command setup#
Install Phel as a dev dependency, then let it detect the agents already in your project:
composer require --dev phel-lang/phel-lang
vendor/bin/phel agent-install --auto--auto looks for signals like .claude/, .cursor/, AGENTS.md, or .github/copilot-instructions.md and installs only for the tools you actually use. Prefer to be explicit? Name a platform, or install everything:
vendor/bin/phel agent-install claude # just Claude Code
vendor/bin/phel agent-install --all # every supported platformExisting files are backed up to *.pre-phel.bak first, unless you pass --force.
What each platform gets#
The skill file lands where each tool looks for it:
| Platform | File installed |
|---|---|
| Claude Code | .claude/skills/phel-lang/SKILL.md |
| Cursor | .cursor/rules/phel.mdc |
| Codex | AGENTS.md |
| GitHub Copilot | .github/copilot-instructions.md |
| Gemini | GEMINI.md |
| Aider | CONVENTIONS.md |
The shared docs tree#
Alongside the skill file, agent-install copies an .agents/ directory into your project root (skip it with --no-docs):
.agents/RULES.md: the hard rules, modern-feature list, and CLI cheatsheet..agents/quick-syntax.md: a one-screen syntax reference..agents/index.md: an intent-to-recipe map..agents/tasks/: focused recipes (HTTP apps, CLI tools, tests, macros, debugging errors, pattern matching, schema validation, and more)..agents/examples/: small runnable sample projects (add with--with-examples).
The per-tool skill file tells the agent to load these in order, so it reads the rules and gotchas before writing a line.
Useful flags#
| Flag | Effect |
|---|---|
--auto | Install only for agents detected in the project. |
--all | Install for every supported platform. |
--with-examples | Include the .agents/examples/ sample projects. |
--no-docs | Install only the skill file, skip the .agents/ tree. |
--dry-run | Print what would be written, change nothing. |
--force | Overwrite without creating .pre-phel.bak backups. |
--uninstall | Remove installed skill files, restoring any backup. |
No CLI? Fetch the reference directly#
For agents or scripts that cannot run the Phel CLI, the same knowledge is on the web as plain text:
curl https://phel-lang.org/agentic-coding.md: the single-page Agentic Coding reference, no HTML chrome.curl https://phel-lang.org/llms.txt: a link index of the whole documentation for LLM consumers.
Where to go next#
- Agentic Coding : the reference an agent should load, with a truncation-safe rules table.
- Cheat Sheet : the filterable core surface.
- CLI Commands : every
phelsubcommand.