DesignX

AI-powered product design pipeline — from brief to working app.

DesignX is a local-first design tool that runs entirely on your machine. It uses your GitHub Copilot subscription to guide you through a structured design process: research, personas, journey maps, feature trees, data models, and generated code — all in one place.

Requirements

• Node.js 18 or later
• An active GitHub Copilot subscription

Getting started

npx @studioindia/designx

That's it. DesignX starts a local server on port 3000 and opens the UI in your default browser. All your data is stored in ~/DesignX/ on your own machine — nothing is sent to any external server.

On first launch, click Connect GitHub Copilot and follow the Device Flow prompt to authenticate with your GitHub account.

Options

designx [options]

  --port <port>       Port to listen on            (default: 3000)
  --data-dir <path>   Where to store project data  (default: ~/DesignX)
  --no-open           Do not open browser automatically
  --version, -v       Print version
  --help,    -h       Print help

Examples

# Default
npx @studioindia/designx

# Custom port
npx @studioindia/designx --port 8080

# Custom data directory
npx @studioindia/designx --data-dir ~/Documents/my-designx

# Headless (no browser auto-open)
npx @studioindia/designx --no-open

Data directory layout

~/DesignX/
├── data/
│   ├── kb-jobs.json
│   └── agent-runs.json
└── projects/
    └── {project-slug}/
        ├── project.json
        ├── conversation.json
        ├── artifacts.json
        ├── session.json
        ├── uploads/        ← knowledge base files
        └── built-app/      ← exported generated code

How authentication works

DesignX uses GitHub Device Flow — the same flow used by the GitHub CLI. You are redirected to github.com/login/device, enter a short code, and authorize the app with your own GitHub account. No passwords are stored by DesignX. Your access token lives only in your local ~/DesignX/ directory.

Updates

DesignX checks for new versions on startup. When an update is available, a banner appears in the UI with a Relaunch to update button — click it and DesignX restarts with the latest version automatically.

To update manually:

npx @studioindia/designx@latest

Troubleshooting

Port already in use (EADDRINUSE)

If you see an error like Error: listen EADDRINUSE: address already in use 127.0.0.1:3000, the port is already occupied by another process.

Option 1: Use a different port

npx @studioindia/designx --port 3001

Option 2: Kill the process using port 3000

macOS/Linux:

lsof -ti tcp:3000 | xargs kill -9

Windows (PowerShell):

netstat -ano | findstr :3000
taskkill /PID <PID> /F

(Replace <PID> with the process ID from the first command)

Command not found

If you get command not found: designx or command not found: npx, Node.js is not installed or not on your PATH.

Install Node.js:

• Visit nodejs.org and download Node.js 18 or later
• Verify installation: node --version (should print v18.x.x or higher)

Then try:

npx @studioindia/designx

Browser doesn't open automatically

DesignX starts a server on localhost, but the browser window may not open on some systems.

Manual fix: Open your browser and navigate to:

http://localhost:3000

Or run DesignX with the --no-open flag acknowledged, then open the URL manually:

npx @studioindia/designx --no-open

Data directory permission error

If you see permission errors accessing ~/DesignX/, ensure the directory is readable and writable:

macOS/Linux:

chmod -R 755 ~/DesignX

Or use a custom data directory with proper permissions:

npx @studioindia/designx --data-dir ~/Documents/designx-data

GitHub authentication fails

• Ensure you have an active GitHub Copilot subscription
• On the Device Flow prompt, verify you entered the correct code at github.com/login/device
• Clear your local token and try again:

  rm ~/DesignX/data/*.json
  npx @studioindia/designx

License

MIT