Skip to content
knomit

Quick start

knomit is a distributed, decentralized knowledge base built from facts — knowledge + commit. This page gets you from zero to a running server with a peer connected.

Requirements

Section titled “Requirements”
  • Go 1.24+ — the entire backend.
  • Node.js + npm — builds the embedded React frontend.
  • Git CLI — knomit shells out to git.
  • A C compiler — Xcode Command Line Tools on macOS (xcode-select --install), or gcc / build-essential on Linux. The build is CGO-based (SQLite and the ONNX bindings are compiled in).

Build and run

Section titled “Build and run”

  1. Clone the repository and enter it.

    Terminal window
    git clone https://github.com/knomit/knomit.git
    cd knomit

  2. Download the native libraries (one-time).

    Terminal window
    make setup

  3. Build the web frontend and the Go binaries.

    Terminal window
    make build

  4. Start the server.

    Terminal window
    make run

Open http://localhost:19278/ for the web UI. The default repo (trunk) is created automatically on first run.

Connect an agent over MCP

Section titled “Connect an agent over MCP”

The simplest setup uses knomit-bridge over stdio — it auto-discovers your agent branch from the running server, so you never look it up by hand.

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "knomit": {
      "command": "dist/knomit-bridge",
      "args": ["--repo", "trunk", "--source", "trunk", "--profile", "code"]
    }
  }
}

--source is the slug used in src:// refs (defaults to --repo if omitted).

Write your first fact

Section titled “Write your first fact”

With an agent connected, ask it to remember something. Under the hood it calls knomit_learn, which writes a markdown fact and commits it:

---
type: observation
confidence: 0.8
domain: [music]
entities: [alice]
refs:
  - knomit://github.com/org/repo/src/preferences.ts
---
Alice prefers rock music over jazz.

That write is one atomic, signed git commit on your agent’s branch. Browse it in the web UI, or query it back with knomit_query.

Where to next

Section titled “Where to next”

Give your agent a knowledge base

Wire knomit into Claude Code or Claude Cowork — slash commands, hooks, and the bridge.

Understand the model

Read Concepts for facts, the ontology, branches, provenance, and the temporal graph.