Built-in tools

The tools available to Mind's agent — file operations, shell commands, web access, search, and more

Mind's agent includes built-in tools for development tasks. These are provided by the unified agent harness and shared across surfaces. The default agent has access to all built-in tools — custom agents can restrict this.

Cross-surface	File read/write, shell, web search/fetch, sub-agents, context, task tracking, introspect
IDE and CLI	Hook creation
IDE and Web	Agent Plugins (`mind_plugins`)
IDE only	Background processes (dev servers)
CLI only	Goal, session settings, MCP tool search

Tool catalogue

Tool	Category	Description
read_file / read_files	File	Read single or multiple files
list_directory	File	List directory contents
file_search	File	Fuzzy file path search (glob)
grep_search	File	Regex content search
fs_write	File	Create or overwrite a file
fs_append	File	Append to an existing file
str_replace	File	Targeted text replacement
delete_file	File	Delete a file
execute_bash	Shell	Run a shell command
web_search	Web	Search the web
web_fetch	Web	Fetch content from a URL
invoke_subagent	Agent	Delegate tasks in parallel
disclose_context	Context	Activate skills or steering
introspect	Context	Answer questions about Mind's own features
todo_list	Session	Track tasks within a session

Surface availability

Tool	IDE	CLI	Web	Status
control_bash_process	✓	—	—	GA
mind_plugins	✓	—	✓	GA
create_hook	✓	✓	—	GA
code	—	✓	—	GA

Web tools

Tool	Description
web_search	Search the web for current information
web_fetch	Fetch and extract text content from a URL

Sub-agent delegation

Tool	Description
invoke_subagent	Delegate a task to an agent running in isolated context

Context tools

Tool	Description
disclose_context	Activate skills or steering files into context
introspect	Search indexed Mind documentation

Configuring tool access

Use the tools field of a custom agent to control which tool categories are available:

{
  "tools": ["read", "write", "shell", "web"]
}

Tip: Need tools beyond the built-in set? Add custom tools via MCP servers — databases, APIs, cloud services, and any tool that speaks the Model Context Protocol.

File tools (read)

Tool	Description
read_file	Read a single file (text or image). Aliases: `fs_read`
read_files	Read multiple files with optional line ranges
list_directory	List directory contents in long format
file_search	Fuzzy file path search (glob patterns). Aliases: `glob`
grep_search	Regex content search across files. Aliases: `grep`

File tools (write)

Tool	Description
fs_write	Create or overwrite a file. Aliases: `write`
fs_append	Append content to the end of an existing file
str_replace	Replace exact text in a file (targeted edits)
delete_file	Delete a file

Shell tools

Tool	Description	Surfaces
execute_bash	Run a shell command	IDE · CLI · Web
control_bash_process	Start/stop long-running background processes	IDE · CLI
get_process_output	Read output from a background process	IDE · CLI
list_processes	List running background processes	IDE · CLI

rules:
  - capability: shell
    match: ["git *", "npm *", "cargo *"]
    effect: allow
  - capability: shell
    match: ["rm -rf *", "sudo *"]
    effect: deny