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Slatewave works best when it becomes the visual baseline for the tools you already keep open all day. Start with one surface, then add the nearby tools that share the same palette contract.

Fastest path: the Slatewave CLI

The Slatewave CLI installs, activates, and uninstalls every theme in the family. One command to install the binary, one more to pick the themes you want.

macOS / Linux (via Homebrew)

brew tap kevinlangleyjr/slatewave
brew install slatewave
slatewave init

Linux (native distro package)

Each release ships .deb, .rpm, .apk, and Arch packages on the Releases page — download the file matching your distro and architecture, then install with the matching package manager (dpkg -i, rpm -i, apk add --allow-untrusted, or pacman -U).

Windows

Download slatewave_windows_*.zip from the Releases page, extract slatewave.exe, and put it somewhere on %PATH%. Then:

slatewave init

slatewave init detects which Slatewave-supported tools are already on this machine, multi-selects what’s worth installing, and runs the install through a live dashboard. Every step backs up the configs it touches so slatewave uninstall can reverse cleanly later.

The CLI is OS-aware: themes that don’t work on the current platform are hidden from list, browse, init, and tab-completion entirely. On Windows that’s a focused set today — VSCode, Starship, Oh My Posh, and Windows Terminal — so slatewave init only offers what’ll actually install end-to-end.

Prefer to do it yourself, tool-by-tool? The manual paths below skip the CLI entirely.

Manual paths

Editor-first setup

Use this if VSCode or Cursor is where you spend most of your time.

code --install-extension kevinlangleyjr.slatewave

Then add matching nearby surfaces:

1. Oh My Posh or Starship for your prompt
2. Ghostty or iTerm2 for terminal chrome
3. Obsidian or Logseq for notes

Terminal-first setup

Use this if your shell is the anchor of your workflow.

1. Install a prompt theme: Oh My Posh or Starship
2. Match your terminal emulator: Ghostty, iTerm2, Alacritty, WezTerm, or Windows Terminal
3. Add tmux if it is part of your daily setup

Browse terminal themes

Whole-workspace setup

Use this when you want the palette to travel across your full developer environment.

1. Pick your editor from the editor themes
2. Pick your terminal stack from the terminal themes
3. Add notes, launcher, and chat surfaces from all themes

If you’d rather not curate this surface-by-surface, slatewave init does the same job interactively — it’ll only offer to install themes for tools you actually have.

What to expect on each theme page

Every shipped theme page includes:

• A preview that uses the same palette values you install
• Repository activity and release metadata when available
• A primary install action near the top of the page
• Copyable install commands when a CLI install exists
• Manual steps when the host app requires app-specific setup

Extending Slatewave

When porting Slatewave to a new tool, use the semantic roles from the palette spec instead of matching screenshots by eye. The goal is not just similar colors; it is consistent meaning across tools.

Before starting a new port:

1. Confirm the target app supports user-installable themes
2. Map background, foreground, selection, focus, warning, error, and syntax roles to the closest native theme keys
3. Keep the repo public so the site can link to source, releases, and issue tracking
4. Add the theme metadata to this website once install steps are stable

For contribution details, see Contributing.