Node Tools Reference

Node tools are provided by connected CLI node instances (gsv node). Each node registers its tools with the Gateway over WebSocket. Node tools execute on the node's local machine, not on the Gateway.

Tool definitions are in cli/src/tools/. The Tool trait is defined in cli/src/tools/mod.rs.

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Tool Namespacing

When a node connects to the Gateway, its tools are namespaced with the node's ID:

{nodeId}__{toolName}

Examples:

• laptop__Bash — Bash tool on the node named laptop
• server__Read — Read tool on the node named server

When multiple nodes are connected, each node's tools are independently namespaced. The agent calls tools by their full namespaced name.

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Path Resolution

All file-oriented node tools (Read, Write, Edit, Glob, Grep) resolve relative paths against the node's configured workspace directory. Absolute paths are used as-is.

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Bash

Execute shell commands on the node. Supports synchronous execution, background mode, and yield-based async execution with session tracking.

Tool name: Bash

Parameter	Type	Required	Default	Description
command	string	Yes	—	Shell command to execute. Must not be empty.
workdir	string	No	Node workspace	Working directory. Relative paths resolve against the node workspace.
timeout	number	No	300000 (5 min)	Timeout in milliseconds. When exceeded, the process receives SIGTERM then SIGKILL.
background	boolean	No	false	Run in background immediately and return a sessionId.
yieldMs	number	No	—	Wait this many milliseconds, then background the process if still running. Clamped to range 10–120000 ms.

Execution Model

Commands are executed via the user's login shell ($SHELL environment variable, falling back to /bin/sh) with flags -lc.

• Synchronous (default): Blocks until the command completes. Returns full output.
• Background (background: true): Returns immediately with a sessionId for tracking.
• Yield (yieldMs): Waits up to the specified duration. If the command completes within the window, returns the result. Otherwise, backgrounds the process and returns a sessionId.

Output Constraints

• Maximum captured output: 200,000 characters. Output beyond this limit is truncated (tail preserved).
• Tail buffer: last 4,000 characters, always maintained.
• truncated field indicates whether output was truncated.

Output (completed)

{
  "status": "completed" | "failed",
  "sessionId": "<uuid>",
  "exitCode": <number | null>,
  "signal": "<string | null>",
  "timedOut": <boolean>,
  "startedAt": <timestamp_ms>,
  "endedAt": <timestamp_ms>,
  "durationMs": <number>,
  "output": "<full captured output>",
  "tail": "<last 4000 chars>",
  "truncated": <boolean>,
  "workdir": "<path>"
}

Output (backgrounded/running)

{
  "status": "running",
  "sessionId": "<uuid>",
  "pid": <number>,
  "startedAt": <timestamp_ms>,
  "tail": "<last 4000 chars>",
  "workdir": "<path>"
}

Security

• Commands run with the permissions of the user who started the node process.
• No sandboxing beyond OS-level user permissions.
• Timeout enforcement: SIGTERM is sent first, followed by SIGKILL after 250ms if the process does not exit.

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Process

Manage background Bash sessions. This tool is registered alongside Bash and provides lifecycle management for backgrounded processes.

Tool name: Process

Parameter	Type	Required	Default	Description
action	string	Yes	—	Action to perform. One of: "list", "poll", "log", "write", "submit", "kill".
sessionId	string	Varies	—	Session ID. Required for all actions except "list".
data	string	No	""	Data to send for "write" and "submit" actions.
offset	number	No	0	Log line offset for "log" action.
limit	number	No	200	Maximum log lines for "log" action. Minimum 1.

Actions

Action	Description
list	List all backgrounded sessions (running and recently finished). Sorted by start time, newest first. Finished sessions are retained for 30 minutes.
poll	Check the status of a backgrounded session. Returns current status, exit code, signal, tail output, and whether still running.
log	Retrieve output lines from a backgrounded session with offset/limit pagination. Returns total line count and character count.
write	Write raw data to the stdin of a running backgrounded session.
submit	Write data to stdin with an appended newline (simulates pressing Enter).
kill	Send SIGKILL to a running backgrounded session.

Error Conditions

• Actions other than "list" fail if sessionId is not provided.
• poll, log, write, submit, and kill fail if the session is not found or is not backgrounded.
• write and submit fail if the session has already exited or stdin is not writable.

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Read

Read file contents from the node's filesystem. Supports text files with line-numbered output and image files with structured content blocks.

Tool name: Read

Parameter	Type	Required	Default	Description
path	string	Yes	—	Path to the file. Relative paths resolve against the node workspace.
offset	number	No	0	Line number to start reading from (0-based). Ignored for image files.
limit	number	No	Total line count	Maximum number of lines to read. Ignored for image files.

Output (text files)

{
  "path": "<resolved absolute path>",
  "content": "<line-numbered content>",
  "lines": <number of lines returned>
}

Content is returned with each line prefixed by a 1-based line number and tab separator (format: {lineNum}\t{content}). Line numbering starts at offset + 1.

Output (image files)

When a file cannot be read as UTF-8 text, the tool reads raw bytes and detects the MIME type via magic-byte sniffing (using the infer crate). If the file is an image (image/*), the tool returns a structured content result:

{
  "content": [
    { "type": "text", "text": "Image file: photo.png (image/png, 245760 bytes)" },
    { "type": "image", "data": "<base64-encoded image data>", "mimeType": "image/png" }
  ]
}

The Session DO detects this structured format and passes the ImageContent block through to the LLM as part of the ToolResultMessage, allowing the model to see the actual image.

Image file size is capped at 10 MB. Files larger than 10 MB return an error. The offset and limit parameters are ignored for image files — the full image is always returned.

Output (non-image binary files)

Binary files that are not images return a descriptive error:

{
  "error": "Binary file: archive.tar.gz (application/gzip, 5242880 bytes) — not a text or image file"
}

Error Conditions

• File does not exist or is not readable.
• Path resolves to a directory.
• Image file exceeds the 10 MB size cap.
• Binary file is not an image type.

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Write

Write content to a file on the node's filesystem.

Tool name: Write

Parameter	Type	Required	Default	Description
path	string	Yes	—	Path to the file. Relative paths resolve against the node workspace.
content	string	Yes	—	Content to write.

Output

{
  "path": "<resolved absolute path>",
  "bytes": <number of bytes written>
}

Side Effects

• Creates parent directories if they do not exist.
• Overwrites the file if it already exists.

Error Conditions

• Parent directory creation fails (permissions).
• File write fails (permissions, disk full).

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Edit

Edit a file by replacing exact text matches on the node's filesystem.

Tool name: Edit

Parameter	Type	Required	Default	Description
path	string	Yes	—	Path to the file. Relative paths resolve against the node workspace.
oldString	string	Yes	—	Exact text to find and replace.
newString	string	Yes	—	Replacement text.
replaceAll	boolean	No	false	Replace all occurrences. When false, replaces only the first occurrence but requires exactly one match.

Output

{
  "path": "<resolved absolute path>",
  "replacements": <number of replacements made>
}

Error Conditions

• File does not exist or is not readable.
• oldString not found in file content.
• oldString found multiple times and replaceAll is false — error includes the match count and suggests using replaceAll: true.

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Glob

Find files matching a glob pattern on the node's filesystem.

Tool name: Glob

Parameter	Type	Required	Default	Description
pattern	string	Yes	—	Glob pattern (e.g. "**/*.md", "src/**/*.rs").
path	string	No	Node workspace	Directory to search in. Relative paths resolve against the node workspace.

Output

{
  "pattern": "<original pattern>",
  "basePath": "<resolved search directory>",
  "matches": ["<path>", ...],
  "count": <number of matches>
}

Results are sorted by modification time, newest first.

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Grep

Search file contents using regular expressions on the node's filesystem.

Tool name: Grep

Parameter	Type	Required	Default	Description
pattern	string	Yes	—	Regex pattern to search for (Rust regex crate syntax).
path	string	No	Node workspace	Directory to search in. Relative paths resolve against the node workspace.
include	string	No	—	File name glob pattern to filter files (e.g. "*.md", "*.{rs,ts}"). Matched against file name only, not full path.

Output

{
  "pattern": "<original pattern>",
  "basePath": "<resolved search directory>",
  "matches": [
    { "path": "<file path>", "line": <1-based line number>, "content": "<matching line>" },
    ...
  ],
  "count": <number of matches>
}

When total matches exceed 100, results are truncated and the output includes "truncated": true instead of "count".

Behavior

• Follows symbolic links.
• Skips binary files (files that fail UTF-8 read).
• Matching line content is truncated to 200 characters.

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Capability Mapping

Each node tool reports its capabilities to the Gateway. These capability IDs are used for skill eligibility evaluation.

Capability ID	Tools
filesystem.list	Glob
filesystem.read	Read
filesystem.write	Write
filesystem.edit	Edit
text.search	Grep
shell.exec	Bash, Process

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Host Capability Profiles

Nodes are differentiated by their reported capabilities (not by a fixed role field).

Example profile	Typical capabilities
General-purpose shell node	filesystem.list, filesystem.read, filesystem.write, filesystem.edit, text.search, shell.exec
Search-only node	text.search

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Runtime Information

Nodes report additional runtime metadata to the Gateway:

Field	Type	Description
clientPlatform	string	Client platform string from the node handshake (for example darwin-arm64, linux-x64).
clientVersion	string	Node client version string.