Paneflow

Your First Paneflow Session

Launch Paneflow, split your first pane, and learn the core mental model in under five minutes.

TL;DR. Run paneflow. Hit Cmd/Ctrl+Shift+D to split horizontally, Alt+Arrow to move focus, Cmd/Ctrl+Shift+N to add a workspace. That is the entire core flow.

Paneflow's mental model is two layers: workspaces (independent project contexts) and panes (terminal splits inside a workspace). This page walks you from a fresh install to a working two-pane setup without any configuration.

Keybindings use the secondary modifier, which resolves to Cmd on macOS and Ctrl on Linux. The notation Cmd/Ctrl+Shift+D below means "use whichever applies on your OS."

Screenshots for this page ship with the v0.3.0 docs sprint. The prose below assumes you are following along on your own machine.

How do I launch Paneflow?

Run the binary from a terminal, or open the app from Spotlight, the Applications folder, or your launcher:

paneflow

The window opens with a single workspace and a single shell pane. The workspace is named after the directory you launched from; a launch from ~/projects/api opens a workspace called api. Your default shell ($SHELL) starts inside the pane.

Window does not render? Paneflow uses Vulkan on Linux and Metal on macOS. The window will fail to open if your graphics driver does not support the platform's required API. Confirm your driver is up to date, check the Linux Vulkan note, or open a GitHub issue with your OS and driver version.

How do I split a pane?

Two split directions:

  • Cmd/Ctrl+Shift+D splits the focused pane horizontally (top and bottom).
  • Cmd/Ctrl+Shift+E splits the focused pane vertically (side by side).

Each new pane spawns a fresh shell in the same working directory as the source pane. Try both: split once horizontally, focus the new pane, then split that one vertically. You now have three shells in a single workspace.

How do I move focus between panes?

Alt+Arrow works the same way on every OS:

  • Alt+Left and Alt+Right focus the pane to the left or right.
  • Alt+Up and Alt+Down focus the pane above or below.

The active pane has a brighter title-bar border, so you can tell at a glance which pane will receive your next keystroke.

How do I create a second workspace?

Cmd/Ctrl+Shift+N opens a native folder picker. Pick a directory and a new workspace appears in the sidebar, named after the folder. The workspace starts with one shell pane already CWD'd into your choice.

To switch between workspaces:

  • Cmd/Ctrl+1 through Cmd/Ctrl+9 jumps to workspace 1 through 9.
  • Cmd/Ctrl+Tab rotates to the next workspace.

The sidebar on the left lists every open workspace. Click a workspace name to jump to it.

How do I close a pane?

Cmd/Ctrl+Shift+W closes the focused pane. If it is the last pane in a workspace, the workspace stays open with an empty placeholder until you open a new pane or close the workspace itself with Cmd/Ctrl+Shift+Q.

What's next?

Get started

Install Paneflow and run your first multi-pane agent workspace in under two minutes.

Keybindings

Every Paneflow keyboard shortcut, grouped by what it controls, with the action name to use in paneflow.json overrides.

On this page

How do I launch Paneflow?How do I split a pane?How do I move focus between panes?How do I create a second workspace?How do I close a pane?What's next?