Binteca Research Based Coding Workspace

What it is

Researcher — by Binteca — is the Binteca Research Based Coding Workspace: a macOS desktop app built on AIPOCH Open-Science, the open-source, local-first research workbench. It keeps everything Open-Science does — projects, sessions, Python/R notebooks, literature, connectors, skills, provenance — and adds one product decision on top: the agent is a coder that researches first.

Research before code

Every dependency and API a change relies on is checked against a primary source before the code is written, and the response says what was checked and when.

Your folder, not a sandbox

A project can declare a workspace folder on your Mac. Sessions run there; the agent reads, edits, runs tests and commits inside it.

Your Claude or Codex

The engine is Claude Code, Codex, OpenCode or CodeBuddy, connected in the app with your own subscription login or API key. No .env files.

Install

Download the latest researcher-<version>-mac-arm64.dmg from the releases page (Apple Silicon; macOS 12 or newer).
Open the DMG and drag Researcher into Applications.
The build is ad-hoc signed, not notarised. On first launch macOS may say the app is from an unidentified developer: right-click the app, choose Open, and confirm once. If a previous copy is installed, remove it first — one install per Mac.

Separate from Open Science. Researcher keeps its own state in ~/.researcher and never touches ~/.open-science, so both apps can be installed side by side. You go through first-run setup once.

First run

Five guided steps, the same as upstream:

Environment — compatibility, storage, keychain and network checks.
Data location — where notebooks, uploads and environments live.
Agent runtime — Claude Code, Codex, OpenCode or CodeBuddy. Researcher can install an app-managed runtime; no Node, npm or admin password needed.
Model provider — sign in with an existing Claude or Codex subscription, or enter a provider API key. The connection is tested before you continue.
Notebook runtime — optional app-managed Python and R.

Workspace folder

This is the change that makes Researcher a coder. In New project or Project Settings there is a Workspace folder field with a Choose… button. Pick the folder your code lives in — for example ~/Projects/my-app.

Every new session in that project starts with the folder as its working directory.
The agent's file tools read and write inside the folder (and nowhere else, unless you grant more folders — see below).
The Notebook shell and kernels may write inside the folder, including its .git, so npm test, pip install -e . and git commit work. Shell commands start in a managed data directory, so the agent prefixes project commands with cd <folder> &&.
Leave the field empty and the project behaves like upstream: a managed folder under the data location, and generated files delivered as Artifacts.

A missing folder is an error, not a fallback. If the declared folder no longer exists, starting a session fails with a clear message instead of quietly working somewhere you did not choose.

Research vs deep research

Depth	When	What happens
Research (default)	Every code task	Quick, targeted checks of the facts the change depends on: current stable version of each package (`pip index versions`, `npm view … version`, `go list -m -versions`, `cargo search`), the documented API of each call, current tooling conventions. The response lists what was checked, the version found, the source and the date.
Deep research	When you ask — say "deep research", or pick the Deep Research skill with `/`	A structured survey: at least three primary sources, two to four approaches compared on fit, maintenance, stability and cost, a dated findings record shown before any code is designed, then the verified specifics the implementation will use.

Both are ordinary skills you can read in the app under Skills: Research-First Coding (always on) and Deep Research. The behaviour is also part of the agent's system prompt, so it applies with every runtime and model.

Researcher never rewrites your code to a newer idiom on its own: where a project pins a version or uses an older pattern on purpose, it keeps the project consistent and says so.

Files, network and approvals

Granted folders

Beyond the workspace folder, the composer's Your files → Grant folder… menu lets you grant more folders read-only or read & write. Researcher honours those grants in the agent's file tools as well as in the Notebook sandbox, so a granted folder is readable (and writable if you said so) everywhere.

Network

Notebook and shell processes reach the network through an allow-list. The first time a command needs a new host — a package registry, a docs site — Researcher asks; allow once or always. Package registries used for version checks fall under the same rule.

Approvals

Each session has an approval mode. Edits inside the workspace, reads and searches can be auto-approved; anything else asks. The agent never bypasses a denial and never reports an action that was blocked as done.

What the agent will not do

Commit unless asked.
Force-push, reset --hard, clean -f, branch -D or rewrite history — those stay with you and your own shell.
Delete files or folders the task did not name.

Command line

Settings → General offers to install the researcher command. It drives the same app headlessly: create projects, run tasks, manage connectors. The Task API accepts an explicit working directory per task and exposes each project's workspacePath in its session defaults.

researcher --help

Build from source

git clone https://github.com/chmjdev/researcher.git
cd researcher
npm ci --no-audit          # Node 22; install scripts for electron/esbuild/prisma are allow-listed
npm run typecheck && npm test
node scripts/fetch-micromamba.mjs osx-arm64 resources/bin/mac/arm64/micromamba
npm run build:mac          # dist/researcher-<version>-mac-arm64.dmg

macOS only. Windows and Linux packaging were removed from this fork on purpose.

Credits and licence

Researcher is a fork of AIPOCH Open-Science by AIPOCH, released under the Apache License 2.0. Researcher keeps that licence; upstream copyright notices are preserved in LICENSE and NOTICE. Its coding discipline comes from cologic, the local-first coding agent this project grew out of.