Spiritus

Spiritus is a native browser for Windows and Linux that does not present websites as pages. It loads a site in a hidden Chromium source surface, extracts live HTML, translates that document into a semantic field, and renders the result as a full-screen geometric projection. The browser shell is minimal on purpose. The interface is the field.

The renderer is built around Pretext for DOM-free multiline text layout, with a browser-canvas fallback if the package is unavailable. It also ships with a terminal projection mode called More Funner Mode that reimagines the same site as animated ASCII in PowerShell or a Linux terminal.

What ships in this repo

• A native Electron browser shell with hidden Chromium source capture
• A Spiritus translation pipeline that turns HTML into semantic entities
• A spatial field renderer with recursive geometry, orbiting nodes, and click to navigate
• Domain-aware heuristics for generic pages and a dedicated X profile
• A terminal ASCII mode called More Funner Mode
• Electron Builder packaging for Windows and Linux
• GitHub Actions for repeatable builds and release artifacts
• SVG, PNG, and ICO brand assets for Spiritus

Core idea

Spiritus treats a website as raw semantic matter. It reads the document, scores meaningful elements, clusters them into semantic regions, and then projects the whole thing into a navigable field.

• Titles become anchors
• headings become attractors
• paragraphs become atmospheric bodies
• links become traversal gates
• authors and posts on X become orbiting identities and emissions

The browser keeps the original site alive in a hidden source window. That means modern pages can run client-side JavaScript, maintain session state, and still be re-rendered in Spiritus without any external API.

Run locally

npm install
npm run start

When Spiritus launches it opens into the field. Invoke the navigation well with / or Ctrl/Cmd+L, enter a URL, and press Enter.

Commands and gestures

• / or Ctrl/Cmd+L opens the navigation well
• Enter navigates to the entered URL
• Backspace goes back
• Shift+Backspace goes forward
• R refreshes the current projection
• P opens the current site in a visible source portal window for login or comparison
• Shift+M launches More Funner Mode in an external terminal
• Click a node with a link to move through the web from inside the field
• Drag to pan and mouse wheel to zoom

Build distributables

npm install
npm run dist:win
npm run dist:linux

Windows builds emit NSIS installer and portable artifacts. Linux builds emit AppImage and deb artifacts.

Publish to npm

npm install
npm run pack:npm
npm publish

The package exposes a terminal entrypoint:

npx spiritus-cli https://example.com

More Funner Mode

ASCII mode runs directly in a terminal and renders a projection of the current page as a live animated field.

npm run more-funner -- https://example.com

Or after publishing:

npx spiritus-cli https://example.com

Release automation

Push to GitHub and use the included workflow. On tag pushes like v0.1.0, the workflow installs dependencies, runs tests, builds Windows and Linux artifacts, and uploads them to the release.

Project structure

assets/                 brand assets and app icons
src/main/               Electron main process and hidden source browser
src/renderer/           full-screen Spiritus field renderer
src/core/               shared translation, layout, and terminal engines
src/cli/                More Funner Mode entrypoint
docs/                   Spiritus language notes and release notes
.github/workflows/      CI for packaged builds
tests/                  Node test suite for parser and terminal renderer

Notes

Spiritus is intentionally minimal in UI chrome. The field is the browser. For sites that require an interactive login flow, use the source portal with P, authenticate, close the portal, and refresh the Spiritus projection.