@lab94/frenchie

Frenchie — your agent's best friend.

Install Frenchie in your coding agent with one command. Frenchie Kit gives agents file and multimodal capabilities: read PDFs and images, transcribe audio and video, extract Office/CSV files to Markdown, and generate images from text prompts. Frenchie Method gives teams a structured workflow from requirement to release.

Upgrading from 0.1.x or 0.2.x? See MIGRATION.md for the breaking changes in 0.3.0 (stdio metadata-only responses, absolute-path MCP configs, new mcp --help / --selftest flags).

This package ships:

• Frenchie Kit (/ocr, /transcribe, /extract, /generate-image, /frenchie-status commands + HTTP/stdio MCP guidance)
• Frenchie Method (/frenchie-method, /requirement, /qa-analysis, /implement, /run-test, /pr-review, /release-check, and related workflow commands)
• The Frenchie stdio MCP server (lab94-frenchie mcp) bundled for npx
• An installer that wires skills and MCP config into your agent

Quick start

1. Install the skills

From the root of your project:

npx @lab94/frenchie install

This installs Frenchie Kit and Frenchie Method skills. Method is text-only and works without an API key.

Optional Method config:

npx @lab94/frenchie install --init-method

This creates .frenchie/method.config.json and .frenchie/.gitignore; it does not edit your root .gitignore.

2. Log in for Kit MCP tools when you need file or image capabilities

Create an account at getfrenchie.dev. You get 100 free credits on your first signup, once per email. No card required.

Then connect your local agent:

npx @lab94/frenchie login

The login command opens a browser device-code flow, then writes FRENCHIE_API_KEY into the MCP config the installer created. The full key is never printed.

Fallback if you already have a key from the dashboard:

npx @lab94/frenchie install --api-key fr_your_key_here

To target a specific agent:

npx @lab94/frenchie login --agent claude
npx @lab94/frenchie login --agent cursor
npx @lab94/frenchie login --agent codex
npx @lab94/frenchie login --agent vscode
npx @lab94/frenchie login --agent gemini

User-level installs (Antigravity, Windsurf, Zed, Claude Desktop) need the --global flag — auto-detect never writes under $HOME:

npx @lab94/frenchie login --agent antigravity   --global
npx @lab94/frenchie login --agent windsurf       --global
npx @lab94/frenchie login --agent zed            --global
npx @lab94/frenchie login --agent claude-desktop --global

Fallback with an existing key:

npx @lab94/frenchie install --agent claude        --api-key fr_…
npx @lab94/frenchie install --agent codex         --api-key fr_…
npx @lab94/frenchie install --agent antigravity   --global --api-key fr_…
npx @lab94/frenchie install --agent claude-desktop --global --api-key fr_…

After login, your agent can call ocr_to_markdown, transcribe_to_markdown, extract_to_markdown, or generate_image. OCR/transcription/extraction results are saved to .frenchie/<name>/result.md automatically; generated images are saved to .frenchie/<slug>/generated.<ext>.

Upgrading later

When a new Frenchie version ships, the pinned package spec inside each MCP config (@lab94/frenchie@0.5.0) needs to point at the new version so npx stops serving a cached older bundle. Two upgrade commands cover everything:

# Project-scoped configs in this directory (.mcp.json, .cursor/mcp.json, .codex/config.toml, etc.)
npx @lab94/frenchie@latest install

# Every $HOME config that already has a frenchie entry — Antigravity, Claude Desktop, Windsurf, Zed,
# and any global Claude Code / Cursor / Codex / Gemini configs you set up. cwd doesn't matter.
npx @lab94/frenchie@latest install --global

install --global is upgrade-mode: it only rewrites frenchie entries that already exist. It will not surprise-install anything new under $HOME. First-time global installs still go through install --agent <name> --global.

3. Restart your agent

The installer prints the restart hint for your agent. After that, ask:

OCR ./report.pdf with Frenchie

…and Frenchie takes it from there.

For workflow orchestration, ask:

/frenchie-method

/frenchie remains the Kit entrypoint in agents that use a single Frenchie command. It is not an alias for Method.

Hosted agents (Lovable, Manus, Claude.ai, ChatGPT.com, Le Chat)

These agents can't run local npm binaries. Use the hosted MCP endpoint instead:

URL:    https://mcp.getfrenchie.dev
Header: Authorization: Bearer fr_your_key_here

The same @lab94/frenchie skill files work in HTTP mode — install them once with install --agent <name> and the included SKILL.md will tell the agent to upload files via upload_file before calling OCR/transcription/extraction. Image generation does not need an upload step in HTTP mode; it returns a short-lived imageUrl that the agent should download for the user.

What you get

Frenchie Kit

Command	What it does
/ocr <file>	Parse a PDF or image into Markdown
/transcribe <file>	Parse audio or video into a Markdown transcript
/extract <file>	Parse DOCX, XLSX, CSV, TSV, or PPTX into Markdown
/generate-image <prompt>	Generate a single image from a text prompt
/frenchie-status	Check credits and recent jobs

Under the hood, Frenchie exposes these MCP tools:

• ocr_to_markdown
• transcribe_to_markdown
• extract_to_markdown
• generate_image
• get_job_result
• upload_file (HTTP mode only)
• fetch_result_file (HTTP mode only)

Frenchie Method

Slash notation is the canonical Method command name. Claude Code reads command files directly. Codex Desktop gets the same entries through wrapper skills such as requirement and qa-analysis; restart Codex after install before trying /requirement. Hosts without slash support can use natural language such as Frenchie Method requirement ....

Command	What it does
/frenchie-method	Route a task through Method from requirement to release
/method-check	Validate Method config, artifacts, gates, and next action
/requirement	Turn a request into scoped requirements
/qa-analysis / /test-case	Design proof before implementation planning
/sa-analysis / /implementation-plan	Analyze architecture and implementation approach
/implement	Execute from Method artifacts using the current agent
/run-test	Run repo-declared verification and write a test report
/pr-review / /review-pr	Review the result, tests, security, and artifact drift
/release-check	Read-only release readiness gate

Method stores optional workflow artifacts under .frenchie/docs/feature/. install --init-method also writes a visible skillTriggers skeleton in .frenchie/method.config.json; command keys are empty slots teams can fill with installed agent skills, for example "requirement": ["brainstorming"]. Teams decide whether to commit or ignore Method config and artifacts.

Invocation — how to call Frenchie in each agent

Every agent handles MCP a little differently. /ocr is a Claude Code-only slash command; Method slash commands are host-dependent and use Codex wrapper skills outside Claude Code. Other agents use natural language, @-mention, or a server-name slash command. All facts below are dogfood-verified.

Agent	Invoke	Full guide
Claude Code	/ocr TOR.pdf	docs
Cursor	Use Frenchie to OCR TOR.pdf	docs
Codex (Desktop / CLI / IDE)	Kit: /frenchie TOR.pdf · @frenchie ocr TOR.pdf; Method: /requirement after restart, or Frenchie Method requirement ...	docs
Antigravity	/frenchie TOR.pdf (invokes by server name)	docs
VS Code Copilot	/frenchie TOR.pdf	docs
Claude Desktop	Use Frenchie to OCR TOR.pdf	docs
Windsurf	OCR TOR.pdf via Frenchie	docs
Gemini CLI	OCR TOR.pdf with Frenchie	docs
Zed	OCR TOR.pdf via Frenchie	docs

Something not working? See the symptom-first troubleshooting guide — every error we've hit in dogfood has a canonical entry.

Pricing

Simple numbers. No subscriptions.

File extraction pricing: DOCX 0.5 credits per page, XLSX 0.5 credits per sheet, CSV/TSV 0.5 credits per file, PPTX 1 credit per slide.

Action	Cost
OCR	1 credit per page
Transcription	2 credits per minute
DOCX extraction	0.5 credits per page
XLSX extraction	0.5 credits per sheet
CSV/TSV extraction	0.5 credits per file
PPTX extraction	1 credit per slide
Image generation	20 credits per image

$1 = 100 credits. Credits don't expire.

Privacy

Files are processed and deleted. Results expire about 30 minutes after first delivery. If you need a durable copy, save the Markdown when it comes back.

Supported formats

OCR: PDF, PNG, JPG, JPEG, WebP

Transcription: MP3, M4A, WAV, MP4, MOV, WebM

File extraction: DOCX, XLSX, CSV, TSV, PPTX

Image generation: PNG, JPEG, WebP output from text prompts

Need help?

• Docs
• Dashboard
• LAB94
• support@getfrenchie.dev