Journeys
Journey: Setup & Onboarding
Go from a freshly installed binary to a fully connected setup: LeanCTX auto-detects every AI editor on your machine, writes their MCP config and a shell hook, then verifies the connection — usually in a single command.
You areinstalling for the first time
onboardsetupinstallbootstrapinitdoctorstatus
You just installed the lean-ctx binary and nothing is wired up yet. This journey covers every command that connects LeanCTX to your editors and your shell, and exactly what each one does.
Quick path
For most users, setup is three commands:
# 1. Install
curl -fsSL https://leanctx.com/install.sh | sh
# 2. Auto-configure everything
lean-ctx onboard
# 3. Restart your shell
source ~/.zshrc
That’s it. onboard auto-detects every AI tool on your machine and writes the MCP config for each one.
What “being set up” means
For LeanCTX to work, three things must be true:
- Your AI tool knows about LeanCTX — its MCP config lists the
lean-ctxserver - Your shell knows about LeanCTX — a hook compresses command output
- A data directory exists —
~/.lean-ctx/holds stats, sessions, and config
Available setup commands
| Command | When to use |
|---|---|
lean-ctx onboard | First-time setup, zero questions |
lean-ctx setup | Full 12-step wizard with all options |
lean-ctx install --repair | Fix drift without prompts |
lean-ctx bootstrap | CI/automation (non-interactive) |
lean-ctx init --agent <name> | Wire up one specific editor |
lean-ctx doctor | Diagnose connection issues |
lean-ctx status | Quick “am I connected?” check |
Verify your setup
After onboarding, confirm everything is connected:
lean-ctx status # quick "am I connected?" check
lean-ctx doctor # deep diagnosis, with fixes for any drift
status shows which editors are wired up and whether the daemon is running. If anything is off, doctor explains the cause and lean-ctx doctor --fix repairs it.
One editor at a time
If you only want to connect a single tool, or add one later, use init:
lean-ctx init --agent cursor # or: claude, codex, opencode, pi, gemini, windsurf, zed …
Each agent’s exact MCP config, shell hook and prompt snippet are generated for you in the per-editor setup on the Getting Started page.
Beyond coding
Once connected, your agent gets more than compressed file reads. The Web & Research layer lets it pull web pages, PDFs and YouTube transcripts into context as compressed, cited evidence, no extra setup required.
Full documentation
The complete setup guide, including platform-specific installation, manual editor configs, troubleshooting, and the detailed 12-step reference, lives on the Getting Started page.