Pi-native TypeScript port – just a heads-up!

[eSaadster]

Hey! 👋

I forked token-goat into my own repo (pi-token-goat) and have been working on a TypeScript/Node.js port over the past week. Wanted to share what I did in case it is interesting.

Two reasons I did this:

1. I use pi (a TypeScript-native coding agent). pi is all Node.js under the hood, so every time token-goat needed to fire I was forking a Python subprocess. I figured embedding the whole thing directly into the JS runtime would be snappier — and it gave me an excuse to finally build something non-trivial in TypeScript.

2. I wanted to see if I could take a substantial real-world tool and port it to a language / framework I am still learning. I am really more of a Python + bash person by trade, and TypeScript + Node was outside my comfort zone. This started as "how hard could it be?" and turned into a couple weeks of reading source, chasing edge cases, and figuring out how to map things like typer → commander, asyncio → async/await, and pytest → vitest. It was humbling and I learned a ton.

What works: All 80+ CLI commands, bash output compression (130+ filters), code/session/skill compaction, image shrinking, read optimization, the hook system — all ported line-by-line. ~280 tests so far (nowhere near your coverage, but it is a start).

What is different: It runs as a single esbuild bundle, the pi integration is a native TS extension instead of a subprocess hop, and the config uses smol-toml / better-sqlite3 instead of Python stdlib equivalents. Same TOKEN_GOAT_* env vars, same TOML config shape, same defaults.

This is absolutely not meant to replace or compete with the Python original — just a personal port for my own stack and a massive learning experience. I figured I would open a PR so it is on your radar in case anyone ever asks about a Node/TS path, and so I can say I finally sent a PR to something real 😅

Thanks for building token-goat — it has saved me a ridiculous amount of tokens.

[Zelys-DFKH]

Genius!
I've been working on something that touches a little bit of that. Let me see if I can bring us closer so you can also benefit from the new optimizations I'm pushing out.
I'm actually TS/JS native myself, and was going Python for the same reason as you!

[Zelys-DFKH]

On the latest version, if you use bash at all, you will probably see another 70% context savings on top of what you were seeing before.

I've started to migrate from my TS branch and will incorporate your ideas. Consider contributing here in the future.