Show HN: Sidequest is a better /btw for Pi

Sidequest, a new extension for the Pi AI agent, provides a side channel for context-aware questions without disrupting the main conversation. It offers threaded, persistent, and tool-capable interactions, and can be installed via npm or GitHub.

Sidequest gives Pi https://pi.dev a side channel: ask context-aware questions without pulling the main conversation off track. Think of it as a better /btw : grounded in the active Pi session, threaded, persistent, and tool-capable. From npm: pi install npm:pi-sidequest From GitHub: pi install git:github.com/peterp/pi-sidequest For local development: pi -e /absolute/path/to/pi-sidequest Or link src/ as an auto-discovered extension directory: ln -s /absolute/path/to/pi-sidequest/src ~/.pi/agent/extensions/sidequest Open Sidequest inside Pi: /sidequest Default quake console keys: § ~ Sidequest has two focus areas: - selection: choose root or a thread - prompt: type and ask the next question Press Tab to move between them. The inactive area shows tab in its border. Use an env var: PI SIDEQUEST QUAKE KEY=' ' or a config file: // ~/.pi/agent/sidequest.json { "quakeKey": " " } Multiple keys are supported: PI SIDEQUEST QUAKE KEYS='§,~,alt+s' { "quakeKeys": "§", "~", "alt+s" } Sidequest runs its own isolated, tool-capable Pi worker. By default it enables: read, grep, find, ls, sidequest web search, sidequest web fetch Override the allowlist: PI SIDEQUEST TOOLS='read,grep,find,ls,sidequest web search,sidequest web fetch' sidequest web search uses Brave Search when BRAVE SEARCH API KEY is set. Otherwise it falls back to DuckDuckGo HTML search. sidequest web fetch fetches public HTTP S pages and extracts readable text. From this directory: npm pack --dry-run npm publish