Installation

Three front doors onto one tree: the plugin marketplace, npm global, and a no-registry github: install — plus the contributor symlink setup.

Forge follows a one tree, three front doors design: the plugin manifest, the hardened installer, and the npm bin all reference the same global/ + source/ tree. Pick the channel that fits your tool.

Choose a channel

Plugin (recommended)

For Claude Code and Codex. Guards auto-wire; nothing to merge.

npm global

For any tool. The forge CLI from the public npm registry.

github: install

No registry needed — install straight from the repo.

Contributor / local dev

Clone + npm link, or bash install.sh for the symlink setup.

Requirements

• Node.js >= 20
• Zero runtime dependencies — everything is a Node built-in. Optional tiers (FORGE_EMBED embeddings, Playwright for uicheck visual) are opt-in and add no required dependencies.

Plugin marketplace

The recommended path for Claude Code and Codex needs no token and no clone:

/plugin marketplace add CodeWithJuber/forgekit
/plugin install forgekit

The plugin wires the guards through ${CLAUDE_PROJECT_DIR} so the pre-action gate and completion gate fire ambiently.

npm global

For any tool, from public npm:

npm install -g @codewithjuber/forgekit
forge doctor          # everything green?

No-registry github: install

npm install -g github:CodeWithJuber/forgekit

Contributor / local dev

npm link

git clone https://github.com/CodeWithJuber/forgekit.git
cd forgekit
npm link

git clone https://github.com/CodeWithJuber/forgekit.git
cd forgekit
bash install.sh

The installer is hardened: idempotent, symlink-based, with backup, and no curl | sh.

Verify

Whichever channel you used, confirm the install:

forge doctor          # tools, guards, MCP auth, config drift, update status

forge doctor also surfaces a non-nagging “commits behind upstream” notice for git checkouts. Set FORGE_NO_UPDATE_CHECK=1 to silence it. Every path is fail-open — offline or detached HEAD reports “unknown”, never an error.

Keeping Forge current

forge update --check          # report whether a newer version is available
forge update                  # apply the update (git checkout or npm/copy install)
forge update --to <version>   # pin or downgrade to a specific version

Now configure a repo

Head to the Quickstart to run forge init and your first substrate check.