hacking-sim

A responsive cyberpunk dashboard and seven visual simulations for modern terminals.

hacking-sim is pure Hollywood terminal theatre. It performs no real scanning, exploitation, credential checking, brute force, exfiltration, or remote access.

Highlights

• Fullscreen TUI with live previews, search, categories, favorites, and responsive panels.
• Seven visually distinct ANSI simulations with compact and wide layouts.
• Centered, responsive style panels that preserve aligned tables and telemetry.
• Unicode-aware clipping, truecolor/256-color fallback, and NO_COLOR support.
• Clean raw-mode, alternate-screen, timer, signal, keypress, and resize lifecycle.
• Zero runtime and development dependencies; built entirely on Node.js APIs.
• Works as both hack and hacking-sim.

Installation

Requires Node.js 18 or newer and npm 9 or newer.

From npm

npm install --global hacking-sim
hack

From this repository

git clone https://github.com/XSaitoKungX/hacking-sim.git
cd hacking-sim
npm install --global .
hack

A local global install is a live link. Changes in the checkout become available immediately without reinstalling.

CLI

| Command | Description | | --------------------- | ---------------------------------------- | | hack | Open the interactive dashboard | | hack <style> | Launch a style directly | | hack random | Launch a random style | | hack list | Print all styles without requiring a TTY | | hack update --check | Check for an npm update | | hack update | Install the latest published version | | hack --version | Print the installed version | | hack --help | Print command help |

Animations require interactive stdin and stdout. Non-interactive hack prints the style list; direct animation commands fail with a clear message and non-zero exit code.

Dashboard controls

| Key | Action | | -------------------- | ------------------------------------------- | | ↑ / ↓, j / k | Select a style | | Tab, ← / → | Change category | | / | Search names, IDs, descriptions, and tags | | Enter | Apply a search or launch the selected style | | Esc | Clear search input or exit the dashboard | | f | Toggle a session favorite | | r | Launch a random style from the visible set | | 1–7 | Launch a style directly | | x | Clear the active search filter | | q | Exit the dashboard |

Inside every style, q, Esc, or Ctrl+C returns safely to the dashboard or exits a direct launch.

Styles

| ID | Experience | Visual language | | ---------- | --------------------------- | ----------------------------------------- | | matrix | Digital rain | Katakana trails, glitch heads, signal HUD | | breach | Fictional terminal session | Typing, hash reveal, centered access finale | | nmap | Fictional reconnaissance | Recon radar, live discoveries, risk matrix | | decrypt | Cipher reveal | Key phases, entropy, fragments, verification | | exfil | Fictional transfer pipeline | Pipeline stages, channels, throughput, events | | glitch | Corrupted display core | RGB corruption, fault states, clock drift | | overload | Reactor meltdown | Escalation phases, coolant, field, neutron flux |

Responsive behavior

The dashboard and simulations read live terminal dimensions. Wide terminals receive centered content blocks and extended telemetry; medium terminals use reduced panels; very small terminals retain only essential status. Tables remain aligned inside centered blocks, and ANSI output is truncated by display-cell width rather than JavaScript string length.

Color output adapts automatically:

• COLORTERM=truecolor or 24bit: 24-bit gradients.
• Other interactive terminals: 256-color fallback.
• NO_COLOR=1: no color sequences.
• TERM=dumb: non-interactive output only.

Architecture

flowchart LR
    User[Terminal user] --> Entry[bin/hack.js]
    Entry --> Parser[src/cli.js]
    Entry --> Screen[src/ui.js lifecycle]
    Screen --> Dashboard[src/menu.js]
    Dashboard --> Registry[src/styles/index.js]
    Registry --> Styles[src/styles/*.js]
    Styles --> Shared[src/styles/shared.js]
    Shared --> Screen
    Entry --> Updates[src/update.js]

sequenceDiagram
    participant CLI as bin/hack.js
    participant UI as withScreen()
    participant Menu as Dashboard
    participant Style as Selected style
    CLI->>UI: open alternate screen
    UI->>Menu: render with live size
    Menu->>Style: run(context)
    loop animation
        Style->>UI: buffered ANSI frame
    end
    Style-->>Menu: q / Esc / Ctrl+C
    Menu-->>UI: exit dashboard
    UI-->>CLI: restore cursor, raw mode, listeners

.
├── bin/hack.js          # executable and dashboard controller
├── src/
│   ├── cli.js           # argument parsing
│   ├── menu.js          # responsive dashboard
│   ├── ui.js            # ANSI, input, animation, lifecycle
│   ├── update.js        # explicit npm update flow
│   └── styles/          # registry, shared helpers, simulations
├── test/                # node:test suites
├── .github/             # CI and contribution templates
├── AGENTS.md            # rules for coding agents
└── package.json

Development

No dependency installation is required.

npm start                # open the local dashboard
npm test                 # run all node:test suites
npm run check            # tests plus syntax checks
npm run release:check    # checks plus npm package dry-run

Adding a style

1. Add src/styles/<id>.js with a default export containing { id, name, desc, tags, run(ctx) }.
2. Register it in src/styles/index.js.
3. Add its path to the syntax-check script.
4. Test resize, tiny terminals, every exit path, menu return, and restart.
5. Update this README and CHANGELOG.md.

See AGENTS.md for the full terminal and architecture contract.

Releases

The project follows Semantic Versioning and maintains a human-curated changelog.

npm run version:patch    # or version:minor / version:major
npm run release:check
npm publish --access public

After changing a local checkout, refresh the global live link with npm install --global .. A published installation can be refreshed with hack update or npm install --global hacking-sim@latest.

Publishing, Git tags, and GitHub releases are intentionally manual so the maintainer can review each release.

Contributing and security

Contributions are welcome. Read CONTRIBUTING.md and the Code of Conduct before opening a pull request. Report vulnerabilities privately according to SECURITY.md.

License

Licensed under the MIT License. Copyright © 2026 XSaitoKungX.