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Studio is the official Kairo IDE. It gives you an editor, live diagnostics from Forge, refactoring, and a UI over the Forge and Pulse workflows, all in one place. Studio is designed to be honest about what the language actually enforces: if Studio suggests something, Forge will accept it, and vice versa.

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What Studio provides

Editor

Syntax highlighting, formatting, and structural navigation for .ak files.

Live diagnostics

Errors and warnings from Forge as you type, with the same diagnostic codes you see in CI.

Refactoring

Rename, move, and reorganize modules without breaking references.

Forge integration

Run forge restore, forge check, forge build, and forge test from the UI.

Pulse integration

Launch applications through Pulse and see stdout/stderr inline.

Package browser

Inspect dependencies and their exported types.

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Design principles

Studio follows the same principles as the rest of Kairo:
  • No hidden behavior. If Studio changes your code, it’s a refactor you invoked. There is no invisible rewriting on save.
  • Forge is the source of truth. Studio does not implement its own type checker. Every diagnostic comes from Forge.
  • Manifest first. Studio treats kairo.toml as authoritative, the same way Forge does.
Studio IntelliSense and language-server behavior are actively being ratified. The core editing and diagnostics experience is stable; some advanced features may change as the language-server protocol matures.

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Typical workflow in Studio

1

Open a package

Point Studio at a folder containing kairo.toml.
2

Restore

Studio invokes forge restore to fetch dependencies and populate the lock file.
3

Edit with live diagnostics

As you edit, Forge continuously re-checks. Diagnostics appear inline and in the problems panel.
4

Run through Pulse

Use the run action to build with Forge and execute the entrypoint through Pulse. Output streams appear in the integrated console.

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Diagnostics you’ll see often

  • Missing module declaration. Every .ak file needs one.
  • Bool-only condition. Kairo has no truthy/falsy conversions.
  • Non-value-like member in a value. Values can only store value-like types.
  • Missing conformance. A type declared as conforming to a contract but missing a required member.
  • Ambiguous or wildcard import. Kairo requires explicit imports.
Each diagnostic includes a stable code you can search for in the Forge CLI reference.

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What Studio does not do

  • Studio does not modify kairo.toml behind your back.
  • Studio does not choose module names from folder paths.
  • Studio does not run generated code or trust build hooks Kairo does not know about.

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Relationship to the rest of the toolchain

  • Studio is the interface. It edits source and drives Forge and Pulse.
  • Forge is the compiler and package tool.
  • Pulse is the runtime.
The three tools share the same manifest, the same lock file, and the same diagnostic contract.

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Next steps

Install the toolchain

Get Forge, Pulse, and Studio on your machine.

Forge CLI

Commands and diagnostic codes shared with Studio.