Strom Research

Research your family's history with an AI agent. strom turns an AI agent — Claude Code, OpenAI Codex, Google Antigravity, OpenCode or xAI's Grok — into a careful genealogical researcher: the agent searches parish registers and archives, you decide, and only what a record proves goes into your family tree. The result is a GEDCOM file for the Strom app or any other program.

Everything stays on your computer: the research is a folder with its full history, and nothing leaves it except the requests to the archives and your conversation with the agent you chose.

Quick Start

With an AI agent you already use

Send it this sentence:

I'd like to research my family history with your help. Please install and start strom as described at https://github.com/ACiDekCZ/strom-research

The agent asks your permission, installs strom, asks where to keep the research and in which language to talk, and opens the conversation for the research.

One line in a terminal

No Node needed: the installer brings the official Node from nodejs.org (the newest release of the Node 24 LTS line) and strom's code (plain JavaScript you can read), checks both against their checksums, puts strom on your PATH and starts a short setup in your language. Nothing needs admin rights.

• Windows (PowerShell): irm https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ACiDekCZ/strom-research/main/install/install.ps1 | iex
• macOS, Linux: curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ACiDekCZ/strom-research/main/install/install.sh | sh

With Node 22.18 or newer: npm install -g strom-research.

The setup asks a few things — language, where to keep the research, which agent (it finds the installed ones and offers Claude if there is none), the model, whether the agent should also write stories of your ancestors, what the agent may do without asking, a shortcut on the desktop — and gets git if it is missing. Then the first conversation begins: tell the agent whom you are looking for and what you know.

Next time: run strom, or double-click the "Strom research" shortcut.

Updates: strom looks for a new version at most once a day and says so; strom update installs it (checked like the installer does), and with it the newest security release of its Node line. Installed with npm: npm install -g strom-research@latest.

Features

Research as a conversation

• The agent explains, asks and proposes; you decide whom to research and what next
• Beginners talk to the agent in its desktop app (Claude, ChatGPT/Codex, OpenCode), experienced users in the terminal — strom opens it in the right folder, set up as you chose
• Or let the agent work on its own through the task queue (strom run) and read the result — or on and on (strom run --loop) while a condition of yours allows it: a gate plugin, e.g. claude-usage 10 (your Claude subscription's daily ration, 10 points in hand), or one of your own (strom gate list)
• Hear what it finds as it finds it: a hook plugin of yours is told of every save — a person added, a session closed — and can send it to your phone (strom hook on <name>, the interface in plugins/hooks/README.md)
• Several agents can work on one family tree side by side, each on its own task

Evidence first

• Every fact cites its record (folio, entry, the words of the register); facts without one stay leads
• Sources, record sets, archives, searches (also the negative ones), hypotheses and decisions — all recorded
• Proposes the next tasks itself: who still lacks proven parents and which books would name them
• Checks the tree for contradictions (ages, dates, duplicates) before every commit
• Every change is a commit; the agent never edits the data directly

Archives

• Downloaders ("connectors") for online archives: the agent builds one itself when the research needs an archive strom does not know yet, and tells you
• A polite limiter for every request (the archive's own pace, slower when it answers slowly, back-off; no limits made up), images checked before they are kept; your own login to a paid portal stays with you
• A standard, versioned plugin interface — see assets/plugins/connectors/README.md

Results

• GEDCOM for the Strom app (witnesses, stories, sources per page) and a strict standard GEDCOM for any other program
• Stories of your ancestors, written from the facts, for the family book (on by default, you may say no)
• The Strom app can open the research directly and follow it live while the agent works
• Each register entry cut out of its scan next to its words, in the file for the Strom app (excerpts.* settings)
• Ask the agent about anyone in the tree — with or without the app
• Or look through it yourself, in strom's menu: the research at a glance (strom stats), what is new (strom recent), what the agent does next (strom plan), one person's life with its records (strom person card), the ancestors as a tree (strom pedigree)
• Hand the research to a relative in one small ZIP file (strom pack): the family tree with its history, the images its records stand on and the connectors — the pages only searched through the archive gives again. They double-click the launcher inside (Windows, macOS, Linux): it installs strom where it is missing, puts the research in place and takes it over (strom unpack)
• Take a family tree off the computer (strom trees remove): a backup offered first, its name typed to confirm, then into the system's trash with the images no other tree uses — never deleted for good

Safe by design

• What the agent may do alone is your choice: ask, auto (default) or full
• Consents are yours: strom asks in a window of the system that the agent can neither see nor click
• strom doctor checks everything strom needs and fixes it with your yes; strom uninstall removes strom again (your research stays)

Everywhere

• Windows, macOS and Linux; strom brings its own official Node, needs no admin rights, and everything it runs is readable JavaScript
• English, Czech and German in the program; the research itself in any language and script

What you need

• A computer with Windows 10/11 (64-bit), macOS or Linux
• An AI agent with an account at its maker — usually a subscription (for example Claude Pro). Choose its best model: the research reads old handwriting and weighs the records.
• git — strom gets it for you if it is missing

For AI agents

The instructions for an agent sent here by its user: install/AGENTS.md. Once installed, strom (no arguments) says where things stand and what to do next, strom guide explains the work, strom commands --json lists every command.

Build from Source

git clone https://github.com/ACiDekCZ/strom-research.git
cd strom-research
npm install
node src/cli.ts --help                # run from sources (Node 22.18+)
npm test                              # node --test
npm run typecheck
npm run build                         # dist/ for npm
npm run release                       # release/: strom-app.tar.gz, SHASUMS256.txt, VERSION, NODE_VERSION, installers

Zero runtime dependencies: TypeScript on Node's built-ins, and git.

License

Copyright © 2026 Milan Víšek.

This Source Code Form is subject to the terms of the Mozilla Public License, v. 2.0. If a copy of the MPL was not distributed with this file, You can obtain one at https://mozilla.org/MPL/2.0/. See LICENSE.

"Strom" is the name of the original project (stromapp.info); please give a modified version a name of its own.