Argent Lite

A walk-up AI satellite for your desk. Runs on a Raspberry Pi 5.

Website · ArgentOS Core · Operator Guide · Discord

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Argent Lite is a Raspberry Pi-native build of ArgentOS designed for one thing: a small appliance on your desk that you walk up to and talk to. A 7" touchscreen, a mic, a speaker, and a Hailo-10H AI accelerator — all driving a single voice-first interface that's part of your personal AI stack.

It runs as a satellite of a Mac-based ArgentOS brain, or standalone with cloud fallback. Either way the data stays local, the event loop stays on your hardware, and the UI stays glance-able.

Think: Amazon Echo Show, except it's yours, it speaks to your agents, and you own every byte.

Why a "lite"?

Argent Lite is not a port. It's a ground-up rebuild for constrained hardware that preserves the ArgentOS mental model while dropping everything that won't survive on a Pi:

argentos-core (your Mac)	argent-lite (the Pi)
PostgreSQL + Redis + Qdrant	SQLite only (node:sqlite)
18-agent department structure	1-N light agents with bounded scheduler
React dashboard + full dev toolchain	Headless-first, optional kiosk HTML
better-sqlite3 + native compile	Zero runtime deps
OpenAI/Anthropic/Groq SDKs	Hand-written OpenAI-compat adapters
OTLP / Prometheus / Datadog	Local JSONL logs + in-process metrics
Unbounded memory growth	Retention + encryption + telemetry wrappers
180-particle AEVP orb at 60 fps	60 particles, 30 fps via PI_PROFILE

What's in Argent Lite

System	What it does
Model Router	4 policies, retry budget, fallback chain. Wrapped by withMemoryLog, instrumentRouter, withRateLimit, withCircuitBreaker.
7 Providers	ollama, hailo, groq, openrouter, anthropic, openai, zai (coder + api). Zero third-party SDKs.
Encrypted Credentials	AES-256-GCM file backend + env backend + rotation wrapper.
Memory Store	SQLite KV + event log + retention + encryption + telemetry wrappers.
Agents & Scheduler	BaseAgent lifecycle, MessageBus, Scheduler, ConcurrentScheduler, RouterAgent, SatelliteAgent.
Channels	CLI stdio, HTTP POST, file-watch, voice-in (Groq Whisper), voice-out (ElevenLabs).
Intent Router	Priority-ordered handlers that map messages to agents.
Observability	Structured JSON logger, counters + histograms (p50/p95/p99), rotating file sink.
Runtime Seam	bootRuntime() — single constructor. argent chat / argent daemon / argent kiosk.
Satellite Protocol	HTTP client + server with mandatory HMAC bearer auth.
Operator HUD	Vendored Python dashboard on :9090 — temps, fan, services, start/stop/restart all services.

Hardware

Component	Part	Notes
Board	Raspberry Pi 5 (16 GB)	Active cooling required
Storage	NVMe via M.2 HAT (≥256 GB)	SD works but wears on sqlite writes
AI Accelerator	Pi AI HAT+ 2 (Hailo-10H)	Optional; stub provider falls through without it
Display	7" Pi Touchscreen (1024×600)	Optional — headless works fine
Audio	USB mic + USB speaker / 3.5 mm	Any ALSA-visible device
Camera	Pi Camera Module 3	Optional, future presence detection
OS	Debian 12 bookworm (arm64)	Pi OS 64-bit works
Node	22+	Needs node:sqlite (22.5+)

Cost: ~$395 USD for the full kit (Pi 5 + NVMe + Hailo + touchscreen + case/fan + audio).

Quickstart — Pi setup in 15 minutes

1. System prerequisites

sudo apt update && sudo apt install -y git curl build-essential python3 alsa-utils

2. Install Node 22 + pnpm

curl -fsSL https://deb.nodesource.com/setup_22.x | sudo -E bash -
sudo apt install -y nodejs
sudo corepack enable
corepack prepare pnpm@10.33.0 --activate

3. Install Ollama (optional, recommended)

curl -fsSL https://ollama.com/install.sh | sh
ollama pull gemma3:1b    # ~815 MB, fits 16 GB easily

4. Clone and build

git clone https://github.com/ArgentAIOS/argent-lite.git
cd argent-lite
pnpm install --frozen-lockfile
pnpm check && pnpm test && pnpm build

5. First-run setup

node dist/src/cli/init.js

Walks you through: mode (standalone/satellite) → providers → API keys (encrypted) → master key generation → satellite Mac URL (optional).

6. Install the systemd service

sudo bash scripts/install.sh
sudo cp /etc/default/argent-lite.example /etc/default/argent-lite
sudo chmod 0640 /etc/default/argent-lite
sudo nano /etc/default/argent-lite    # set ARGENT_MASTER_KEY
sudo systemctl enable --now argent-lite

7. Install the operator HUD (strongly recommended)

sudo ARGENT_INSTALL_DASHBOARD=1 bash scripts/install.sh
sudo systemctl enable --now pi-dashboard
# Open http://<pi-ip>:9090

One dashboard to rule them all: temps, fan PWM, CPU/mem/disk, service health, start/stop/restart every ArgentOS service, launch the React desktop dashboard, reserved kiosk slot.

8. Verify

bash scripts/phase3-smoke.sh
# PASS: channel.in=1 channel.out=1 router.out=1

See docs/operator-guide.md for the full 275-line reference: day-to-day ops, common fixes, upgrade, uninstall.

Walk-up satellite

The kiosk is designed for one mental model: walk up, tap, talk, listen.

┌─────────────────────────────┐
│                             │
│      ●  (orb, pulsing)      │
│                             │
│       "Tap to talk"         │
│                             │
│  ┌───────────────────────┐  │
│  │     TAP TO TALK       │  │
│  └───────────────────────┘  │
│                         ⚙   │
└─────────────────────────────┘

State machine: idle → listening → thinking → speaking → idle

Voice pipeline: arecord → Groq Whisper (~200ms) → bus prompt → RouterAgent → provider chain → ElevenLabs TTS (~500ms first byte) → aplay

Push-to-talk is v1. Wake-word ("Hey Argent") and camera presence detection are planned.

Architecture

src/
├── auth/           Encrypted credentials (env + AES-256-GCM file + rotation)
├── cli/            chat / daemon / ui / kiosk / init entrypoints
├── config/         Mode loader + schema + precedence-based config
├── agents/         BaseAgent, MessageBus, AgentContext, RouterAgent, SatelliteAgent
├── scheduler/      Scheduler, TaskQueue, ConcurrentScheduler
├── router/         ModelRouter + policy + cost + circuit-breaker + rate-limit wrappers
├── providers/      ollama, hailo, groq, openrouter, anthropic, openai, zai
├── memory/         SqliteMemoryStore + retention + encryption + telemetry
├── channels/       cli-stdio, http, file-watch, voice-in, voice-out
├── satellite/      Protocol, HMAC auth, runtime client/server
├── intents/        IntentRouter (priority-ordered handler registry)
├── obs/            Structured JSON logger + metrics + rotating file sink
├── runtime/        Event-kind vocabulary lock (5 kinds, frozen)
├── integration/    bootRuntime() — the ONLY full-stack constructor
├── kiosk/          HTTP server for the 7" touchscreen walk-up interface
└── ui/             HTTP launcher for SSH/desktop debug

deploy/
├── argent-lite.service           Main systemd unit
├── argent-gateway.service        ArgentOS gateway (optional)
├── pi-dashboard/                 Vendored Python HUD + unit + HANDOFF.md
└── *.desktop                     Freedesktop launcher entries

scripts/
├── install.sh / uninstall.sh     Idempotent installer with opt-in gates
├── phase3-smoke.sh               Stub-provider acceptance smoke
├── phase3-ollama-smoke.sh        Real-ollama smoke (load-aware SKIP)
└── hailo-setup.sh / check.sh    Hailo-10H probe + CI smoke

Ports & services

Port	Bind	Service	Required?
—	—	argent-lite.service — the brain	yes
127.0.0.1:7788	loopback	Kiosk (voice + touchscreen)	optional
127.0.0.1:18789	loopback	ArgentOS Gateway (WS API for React dashboard)	optional
127.0.0.1:11434	loopback	Ollama	if using local LLM
0.0.0.0:9090	LAN	Operator HUD (pi-dashboard)	strongly recommended

All argent services are loopback-only. The HUD is the one exception (binds 0.0.0.0 for LAN access).

Security

• Loopback-only by default
• HMAC bearer on satellite — crypto.timingSafeEqual, no unauthenticated path
• AES-256-GCM credential store — per-file random salt + IV, master key required
• Memory at-rest encryption — withEncryption wrapper, not greppable
• Credential rotation — withRotation tracks staleness per provider
• Unprivileged system user — only pi-dashboard runs as root (fan control)
• STRIDE threat model — see ops/projects/security-threat-model.md

Development

pnpm install && pnpm check && pnpm test && pnpm build

• Node 22 + pnpm 10
• TypeScript strict, ESM, isolatedModules
• vitest for 362+ unit + integration tests
• Zero runtime dependencies in package.json
• eslint + prettier

Project status

Phase	Status
Phase 1 — headless router + CLI + auth + providers	✅ live, verified against 4 cloud providers
Phase 2 — agent topology + scheduler + message bus	✅ complete
Phase 3 — memory + channels + intents + observability + runtime seam	✅ complete, stub smoke PASS
Phase 4 — deploy + satellite + config + security + CI	✅ shipped
Phase 5 — walk-up kiosk v0 + voice in/out	🚧 in flight
Future — wake-word, camera, Hailo real integration, TLS	planned

60+ merged PRs. 362+ tests green. 21 cycles of 4-agent autonomous ops.

Contributing

1. Star this repo
2. Join Discord
3. File issues — bugs, feature requests, hardware reports
4. Submit PRs — branch codex/<slice-name>, merge via threadmaster
5. Test on your Pi — the more hardware variants, the better

Related

• ArgentOS Core — the full Mac-side brain. Lite federates with it in satellite mode.
• pi-dashboard — vendored operator HUD.

Acknowledgments

• ArgentOS Core by Jason Brashear — the design language, the AEVP orb, the agent topology, the Gateway. Lite is the Pi sibling.
• Raspberry Pi Foundation — $100 ARM board that runs an LLM.
• Hailo — Hailo-10H accelerator and GenAI Model Zoo.
• Groq, OpenRouter, Z.AI, ElevenLabs — fast cloud inference that makes a Pi feel instant.

License

MIT License. See LICENSE for details.

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_{An ArgentOS project by Jason Brashear · Runs on Raspberry Pi 5 · Accelerated by Hailo-10H · Open source (MIT)}

_{Built in Texas. Runs on your hardware. Answers to you.}