Quorum

Quorum is a simulated organization of autonomous agents, where every agent is a Claude Code session. Agents have roles, talk over a shared message bus, gather for documented meetings, and do real work — they run Bash, write and execute code, and edit files in their own working directory. A coordinator breaks the mission into assigned tasks; agents execute them; the org can hire new agents when it needs a skill it lacks. The whole org runs continuously and on its own, pursuing its mission, while you steer and watch it from a web dashboard.

Requirements

• Node.js ≥ 18 — to run the launcher (npx needs it too). The CLI itself is a self-contained binary; the npm package picks the right one for macOS (arm64/x64), Linux (x64/arm64), or Windows (x64).
• The claude binary on your PATH (run claude once to log in), or an ANTHROPIC_API_KEY in your environment. Every agent's brain is a headless claude session. Set CLAUDE_BIN if claude lives somewhere off PATH.

Agents execute real, unrestricted shell commands on your machine, headlessly — a running turn has no per-command approval, and each agent's working directory is a convention, not a container. Capabilities (allow/ask/deny) and budgets are the control surface; for hard isolation run the org inside a VM or container. Each claude call costs money — use a model and budget you're comfortable letting run unattended — see Cost & budget.

Quick start

An org lives in a directory — the directory is the org, like git init, one directory per org. In an empty directory:

# scaffold a starter QUORUM.md with a mission
npx @meffecta/quorum init --mission "Build and launch a tiny SaaS"

# edit the QUORUM.md it wrote (team, mission, budget), then boot the org:
npx @meffecta/quorum --budget 20

Or install it once and get a global quorum command:

npm install -g @meffecta/quorum
quorum init --mission "Grow a newsletter to 1,000 subscribers"
quorum --budget 20

Open the dashboard at http://localhost:3000 — that's where you both watch the org and talk to it. The terminal just prints activity; it takes no commands.

Three ways to get a QUORUM.md:

• quorum init — scaffolds a starter (a solo CEO with a budget who hires the rest of the team on demand). --mission "..." fills in the mission.
• quorum init --prompt "..." — one claude call drafts the whole file from a plain-words brief (e.g. --prompt "a newsletter studio: an editor leading a writer and a researcher"), which you review and edit before starting.
• Start from a sample — copy a ready-made org from the QUORUM.md guide as your QUORUM.md.

QUORUM.md — the whole org in one file

One Markdown file defines the entire org. Edits take effect on the next boot.

# Acme Labs

A two-person studio shipping weekend projects.

- budget: 25
- defaults: { "provider": { "type": "claude", "model": "claude-opus-5" } }

## Mission

Launch the landing page and collect 100 signups.

## Agents

### CEO

You are the CEO. Set direction, break the mission into tasks, delegate.

### Engineer

- reports to: CEO
- capabilities: { "cms": "allow" }

You are the engineer. Build what's asked and verify it works.

The rules, in one sentence: a key: value line (optionally - bulleted) whose key is recognized is metadata; every other line is prose. The # title is the org name and the prose under it its description; ## Mission is the mission (required); each ### under ## Agents is one agent whose heading is its role and whose prose is its system prompt. Unrecognized ## sections are ignored, so the file can hold notes for humans too.

• Org-level keys (under the title): name, description, budget (a bare number means a lifetime USD cap), defaults, provider.
• Agent keys (under a ###): id, role, goal, reports to, provider, capabilities.

A mission is required — quorum prompts for one at the terminal if you don't provide it, and won't start missionless in a non-interactive shell. Full annotated reference: https://quorum.meffecta.com/docs/quorum-md.

Common flags

start is the default command (just quorum). Useful flags:

| flag | what it does | | --- | --- | | --dir <path> | org home to boot (default: current directory) | | --mission <text> / --mission-file <file> | override the mission | | --budget <usd> | lifetime spend cap — the org halts when it's reached | | --port <n> / --host <h> | where the dashboard listens (default 3000) | | --tick <ms> | pace of the autonomous loop | | --concurrency <n> | max tasks running at once | | --claude-bin <path> | path to the claude binary | | --headless | run without opening the dashboard | | --no-eval / --eval-threshold <n> | disable or tune the review-and-rework loop |

Run several orgs side by side by pointing each at its own dir and port:

quorum --dir ~/orgs/acme --port 3000
quorum --dir ~/orgs/beta --port 3001

The dashboard (chat + observe)

The dashboard at http://localhost:3000 is the control plane. It shows the org chart, the employed-agents roster, goals, the task board, pending requests, spend, and a live activity feed — and a chat at the top. From the chat you:

• Message the whole org — a directive that steers its work (and becomes a goal).
• Message a specific agent — pick them from the dropdown; that agent replies directly, in character.

Agents also raise requests for things they can't do themselves (provision an account, grant access, approve a budget, answer a question). Each pending request has yes / no / answer… — your answer is written into the requesting agent's memory so it uses it next turn.

Tools & permissions

During a task each agent gets a set of tools, gated by a capability policy (allow / ask / deny):

| capability | grants | default | | --- | --- | --- | | code | Bash, Read, Write, Edit, Glob, Grep | allow | | consult | Task (spawn sub-agent consultants) | allow | | web | WebSearch, WebFetch | allow | | delegate | hand a subtask down to a report | allow | | hire | employ a new specialist on demand | allow |

Set defaults under the title (defaults.capabilities) and overrides per agent (capabilities under a ###). Resolution is per-agent → org default → built-in.

Cost & budget

Every claude call reports its cost, appended to a ledger with running totals.

• Dashboard: the Status panel shows today's and this month's spend.
• On disk: logs/cost/ledger.jsonl records every call — spend, tokens, running totals.

Budgets cap autonomous spend — set them in QUORUM.md (- budget: ...), via env vars, or with --budget (a CLI flag beats both). When a daily, monthly, or lifetime cap is reached, the runtime stops spending.

BUDGET_DAILY_USD=5 BUDGET_MONTHLY_USD=100 quorum
quorum --budget 25    # halt for good at $25 total spent

Learn more

• Docs & guides: https://quorum.meffecta.com
• QUORUM.md reference: https://quorum.meffecta.com/docs/quorum-md
• CLI reference: https://quorum.meffecta.com/docs/cli-reference
• Cost & budget: https://quorum.meffecta.com/docs/cost-and-budget

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