The turn view and its keys

The turn view is what efr shows while a turn runs. It is not a full-screen program. The reply goes into your scrollback like the output of any command, and your prompt comes back at once when the turn ends.

The parts of the view

A running turn has three parts, from top to bottom:

1. The reply. The model's text streams in as it arrives. Each tool call shows on its own line.
2. The status row. It shows what the turn does now.
3. The input row. Here you type a steer or the next prompt.

The status row

The last rows of the view show a spinner, what the turn does, its time, how full the model's context is, and the scope:

⠼ thinking  4s  ctx 43%  app

The states include waiting for the model, thinking, writing, preparing <tool>, reviewing: <command> and compacting context. After 20 seconds with no data, the row says so, such as waiting for the model, no data for 25s. The row also shows away while efr counts you away, and full in red for a turn in full mode.

ctx 43% tells how full the model's context is. At 100%, efr compacts the context. The field is green below 50%, yellow from 50% and red from 90%. Conversations, resume and search tells more.

Tool calls

A command of the agent shows on one line with the spinner and its time, and its last three output lines below:

⠹ $ cargo test -p app  12s

When the command ends, one line stays, such as $ cargo test -p app exit 101 6.2s. A failed command also keeps its last three output lines. A file tool shows its diff, and a command that changed files shows one dim line that names them. Undo and diff tells more.

Questions

When the agent asks for approval, a card shows below the reply:

? allow outside the sandbox
│ cd ~/p/app && find target/debug/build \
│     -path '*ghostty*' -type f | awk '{print $1}'
│ runs with your full rights: files, secrets, network
│ programs: cd, find, awk
│ y allow · n deny

y allows, and n denies. At some questions, a (always) and then y saves a rule, so the same action runs with no question next time. When you answer, the card gives its place to one line, such as ✓ allowed or ✗ denied. A question takes the keys first: the input row hides and keeps its text, and comes back after the question. Permission modes tells what asks you in each mode.

The input row

While a turn runs, the input row below the status row shows › . When it is empty, it shows a hint:

› enter steer · tab queue · esc interrupt

The row edits like a shell line: the arrows, Home, End, Ctrl+A, Ctrl+E, Ctrl+U, Ctrl+W, Ctrl+K, Alt+B and Alt+F. Ctrl+B does not move the cursor back; use the Left arrow. A paste keeps its newlines and never sends.

Above the status row, each steer that the model did not read yet shows as ↳ steer: <text>, and each queued prompt as ↳ queued: <text>.

Keys that you type while the prompt goes out land in the row, so you can type at once.

Esc and Ctrl+C

Esc interrupts the turn and keeps your work:

• Steers that the model did not read yet go again as a new prompt, with the note interrupted to send your message.
• The prompts that you queued come back into the row. So nothing runs that you did not see.

Esc never stops a background job. Ctrl+C with text in the row clears the text. On an empty row, Ctrl+C interrupts the turn and ends efr.

Text that is left in the row

Text that is still in the row when efr ends comes back to your command line as , <text>. You can edit it and send it, or remove it. The text never goes back to the shell through a process argument.

Steer from another terminal

,! <text> steers a running turn from another terminal. It acts on the conversation of that terminal's last prompt.

A command that waits for input

When a command of the agent waits for an answer, an answer line takes the place of the input row. Type the answer and press Enter.

• efr does not show a password as you type it.
• When a command prints nothing for 10 seconds and efr sees no prompt, a dim line offers Ctrl+\. Press it to type an input for the command.
• While the last output line looks like a password prompt, the input row hides. What you type then never goes to the model.

The hidden shell has the details.

The end of a turn

A turn that changed files ends with a line such as 3 files changed, +24 -7. Then one dim line sums up the turn:

done in 42s, ctx 43% (89k/206k), 1.1k out, cache 91%

cache 91% is the part of the turn's input that came from the provider's prompt cache. An interrupted turn ends with interrupted after 12s. When the model stopped for a reason, such as the output limit, one line before the end says why.

When a turn ends, a job ends, or a question waits in a terminal that does not follow the turn, your next prompt there shows one line about it:

efr: job j3 ended (exit 0): <title>

The progress bar

In Ghostty 1.2 or later, kitty 0.47 or later and Windows Terminal, the tab shows a progress bar while the turn runs. render.progress sets it: auto (the default), on or off. With auto, efr never sends it inside tmux, GNU screen or zellij.

Exit codes

Settings

These keys are under [render] in config.toml. Only efr reads them, each time it runs.

[render.colors], palette and theme set the colours. Settings and the config.toml reference tell how. NO_COLOR turns colours off.