@schovest/pi-btw

Ask a side question without polluting the main conversation. pi-btw adds /btw <question> to Pi Agent — your same primary model answers in a panel at the bottom of the terminal, using a read-only clone of the current conversation as context. The answer never enters the transcript and never touches disk.

Install

pi install npm:@schovest/pi-btw

Restart your Pi session.

Quick start

Type /btw followed by your question:

/btw why did we switch from sockets to SSE last week?

A panel opens at the bottom of the terminal with your question on a banner, a … while the model works, and the answer when it arrives. Prior /btw questions from this session are listed under the banner, so follow-ups have context.

/btw uses whatever model is already driving your session — there is nothing to pick, but Pi needs an active model with working credentials (/login).

| Key | Action | | --- | --- | | ↑ / ↓ | Scroll the panel whenever content overflows — the hint appears once the answer arrives | | x | Clear this session's /btw history — hint shown only when you have prior entries | | Esc | Dismiss the panel, cancelling the call if it is still running |

What you get

• Nothing leaks into the main chat — the answer is drawn in an overlay, never emitted as an agent message, never written to the transcript, never written to disk.
• The side question already knows your work — it is handed a read-only clone of the current conversation branch, so you do not re-explain context.
• Follow-ups have their own thread — every /btw turn in a session is replayed into the next one, so the side conversation remembers itself.
• Esc cancels only the side question — cancelling it never interrupts what the main session is doing.
• Survives /new, /fork, /resume, /reload — history is held in the running Pi process and clears when Pi exits.
• Correct after compaction — the context snapshot is rebuilt whenever the conversation is compacted or re-branched, so a later /btw never answers off a stale view.
• No tools, plain text — a side question cannot edit a file or run a command.

Reference

• Context model — exactly what each /btw call sends to the model: the branch snapshot and its invalidation rules, session history threading, the cross-session question hint, and the no-pollution guarantees.
• Architecture — modules, registered command and hooks, overlay layout and key handling, process-scoped state, Pi host-version tolerance, and the full error-message list.

Requirements

• An interactive terminal. /btw refuses to run without a UI — it is not available under pi --print or RPC.
• An active primary model with resolvable credentials. Any provider works.

Troubleshooting

| Symptom | Cause | Fix | | --- | --- | --- | | /btw requires interactive mode | Running under pi --print … or RPC | Run Pi interactively | | /btw requires an active model | No primary model configured | Set one with /login, or edit Pi's own ~/.pi/agent/models.json | | /btw model (…) has no API key available. | Credentials for the active model do not resolve | Re-authenticate that provider | | Usage: /btw <question> | /btw ran with no argument | Put the question on the same line | | Pressing X does nothing | Only lowercase x is bound to clear history | Press x | | History gone after restarting Pi | By design — state is process-scoped, never written to disk | Nothing to fix; your main session is unaffected |

Related

• @schovest/pi-pi — the umbrella package. It does not install pi-btw; install this one yourself when you want /btw.
• juicesharp/rpiv-mono — the rest of the rpiv family.

License

MIT — see LICENSE.