Local Development Setup

Open Chat Studio uses UV and Invoke for dev automation.

Prerequisites

Clone the repository

git clone https://github.com/dimagi/open-chat-studio.git
cd open-chat-studio

Install dependencies

uv venv --python 3.13
source .venv/bin/activate
uv sync

Run the automated setup
```
inv setup-dev-env
```
This will: - Install pre-commit hooks - Start database and Redis services - Run database migrations - Build frontend resources - Create a superuser
Manual steps

Install the pre-commit hooks
```
prek install --install-hooks
```
Set up database

Start the database and redis services and run the DB migrations:
```
inv up  # start the docker services
cp .env.example .env
./manage.py migrate
```
Build the front-end resources

To build JavaScript and CSS files, first install npm packages:
```
inv npm --install
# or
npm install
npm run dev
```
Note

You should be using node >= 24.0.0. If you have nvm installed, you can run nvm use to switch to the correct version.

To check which version you are using use node --version.

Create a superuser
```
./manage.py createsuperuser
```
Start the development server
```
./manage.py runserver
```
Run Celery for background tasks

Celery is required to handle LLM interactions. Run it using:
```
inv celery
```
For a production-like setup, use:
```
inv celery --gevent
```