breadcrumb-cli

Breadcrumb

Agents leave notes for other agents.

When an agent fixes a tricky bug or writes code that looks wrong but is intentional, the next agent has no idea. It sees "dead code" and helpfully cleans it up. Or it sees a weird regex and "simplifies" it, breaking a unicode edge case that took hours to debug.

Breadcrumb fixes this. Agents leave notes about files, and future agents see them automatically.

# Agent leaves a note after fixing a tricky bug
breadcrumb add ./src/parser.ts "Regex handles unicode edge cases, don't simplify"

# Future agent reads the file → sees the note automatically
📝 BREADCRUMB: Regex handles unicode edge cases, don't simplify

Installation

npm install -g breadcrumb-cli

Or with other package managers:

pnpm add -g breadcrumb-cli
yarn global add breadcrumb-cli
bun add -g breadcrumb-cli

Quick Start

# Initialize in your repo
breadcrumb init

# Add a note about a file
breadcrumb add ./src/auth.ts "OAuth flow depends on specific token format"

# See notes on a file
breadcrumb check ./src/auth.ts

# List all notes
breadcrumb ls

# Remove a note
breadcrumb rm ./src/auth.ts

Why Not Just Use Comments?

Comments are passive — they sit in a file hoping to be noticed. Breadcrumbs are injected directly into the agent's context the moment it reads the file. They can't be skimmed over or missed.

Also:

• Comments aren't discoverable — breadcrumb ls shows all notes in a repo
• Comments can't span files — One breadcrumb can cover an entire directory

When to Leave Notes

• Code that looks like it could be simplified but shouldn't be
• Bug fixes for edge cases that aren't obvious
• Intentional workarounds
• Security-critical patterns (SQL injection prevention, etc.)
• Performance tuning that looks "overengineered"

Example: Protecting Critical Code

# Money calculations - integers avoid floating point errors
breadcrumb add ./src/utils/money.js "All money as integers (cents) to avoid floating point errors. Ceiling for tax is legally required."

# API retry logic tuned for rate limiting
breadcrumb add ./src/api/client.js "Retry delays tuned for rate limiting - 100ms/500ms/2s/5s matches API provider's backoff recommendations"

# SQL injection prevention
breadcrumb add ./src/db/query.js "CRITICAL: Parameterized queries prevent SQL injection. Never use string interpolation for values."

Now when an agent tries to "simplify" this code:

Request	Agent Response
"Use floating point for money"	❌ Refuses - cites precision errors
"Simplify retry to fixed 1s delay"	⚠️ Warns about rate limit tuning
"Use template literals for SQL"	❌ Hard refuses - SQL injection risk
"Do a full code review and simplify"	✅ Reports all code is intentionally designed

Commands

Command	Description
init	Create .breadcrumbs.json in current repo
add <path> <message>	Add a note (warns about overlaps)
edit <path-or-id>	Edit a note in place
rm <path>	Remove a note
check <path>	See notes on a file
search <query>	Find notes by content
coverage [path]	Show breadcrumb coverage stats
verify [path]	Check if notes are still valid
ls	List all notes
status	Quick overview (counts)
prune	Remove expired notes

Add Options

breadcrumb add <path> <message> [options]
  -s, --severity <level>   # info (default) or warn
  -e, --expires <date>     # Expiration date (ISO 8601)
  --ttl <duration>         # Time-to-live (30s, 5m, 2h, 7d)
  --no-overlap-check       # Skip overlap detection

Edit Options

breadcrumb edit <path-or-id> [options]
  -m, --message <text>     # Replace message
  -a, --append <text>      # Append to message
  -s, --severity <level>   # Change severity
  -e, --expires <date>     # Set expiration
  --ttl <duration>         # Set TTL
  --clear-expiration       # Remove expiration

Search Options

breadcrumb search <query> [options]
  -r, --regex              # Treat query as regex
  -c, --case-sensitive     # Case-sensitive literal search
  -i, --ignore-case        # Case-insensitive regex search
  -p, --path <segment>     # Filter by path segment
  -s, --severity <level>   # Filter by severity

Coverage Options

breadcrumb coverage [path] [options]
  -g, --glob <pattern>     # File pattern (default: **/*)
  --show-covered           # List covered files
  --show-uncovered         # List uncovered files
  -l, --limit <n>          # Max files to list (default: 20)

Verify Options

breadcrumb verify [path] [options]
  --update                 # Update hashes after verification
  --stale-only             # Only show stale breadcrumbs

Staleness Detection

Notes can become outdated when the code they protect changes. Breadcrumb tracks file content hashes to detect when notes may no longer be valid.

# Check if any notes are stale
breadcrumb verify

# Output shows staleness status:
# - verified: File unchanged since note was added
# - stale: File has changed, note may need review
# - unknown: No hash stored (older notes or directory/glob patterns)

# Update hashes after reviewing stale notes
breadcrumb verify --update

When you add a note to a specific file, its content hash is automatically captured:

breadcrumb add ./src/api/client.ts "Retry delays tuned for rate limits"
# Hash is stored → future changes detected

The check command also shows staleness for each note, helping agents understand which notes are trustworthy.

Claude Code Plugin

For Claude Code users, the plugin auto-shows notes when reading files:

/plugin marketplace add tylergibbs1/breadcrumb
/plugin install breadcrumb@breadcrumb-marketplace

The plugin:

• Auto-installs the CLI if not present
• Auto-initializes .breadcrumbs.json on session start
• Injects notes into Claude's context when reading files
• Claude acknowledges notes when they conflict with the current task

Vendor Agnostic

Breadcrumb works with any AI agent system that can run shell commands.

Component	Requirement
CLI (breadcrumb)	Node.js 18+ (or Bun)
.breadcrumbs.json	Plain JSON - works everywhere
Claude Code plugin	Optional integration

For other tools (Cursor, Windsurf, Aider), add to your system prompt or equivalent:

• Check for notes before editing: breadcrumb check <file>
• Leave notes after non-obvious changes: breadcrumb add <file> "message"

Storage

Notes are stored in .breadcrumbs.json at repo root:

{
  "version": 2,
  "breadcrumbs": [
    {
      "id": "b_1a2b3c",
      "path": "src/utils/money.js",
      "pattern_type": "exact",
      "message": "All money as integers (cents) to avoid floating point errors",
      "severity": "info",
      "added_by": { "agent_id": "agent" },
      "added_at": "2026-01-10T14:30:00Z"
    }
  ]
}

License

MIT