Blast

Blast is an embeddable engine that runs unmodified Raycast extensions outside Raycast. It builds an extension, runs each command in its own Node.js process, and hands your app what to draw: scenes, a ready-made view model with Raycast's client behaviour, and requests for anything that touches the OS. You bring the UI; Blast brings the extensions.

Compatibility is measured against the latest @raycast/api, not claimed:

• API coverage: @raycast/api 2.10.1, 1537/1538 current symbols (the remaining one needs the embedder's browser), 942/942 deprecated (COVERAGE.md).
• Real extensions: across all 1,939 corpus extensions Blast's shared libraries cover, 91.4% of 5,759 commands render in a sandboxed, offline sweep (SWEEP.md); 237/253 curated commands render (SMOKE.md); extensions with their own dependencies install and render 51/52 (SMOKE-DEPS.md).

Status: alpha. 3.0.0-alpha.1 is on npm under the next tag, published from GitHub Actions with provenance (release); latest still points at Blast v1 for cli and runtime. The previous prototype is kept at tag archive/v2-prototype-2026-10-18.

npm install @blastlauncher/engine@next @blastlauncher/client-core@next
npx @blastlauncher/cli@next run ./my-extension index

Where it stands (November 2026)

• Done:
  • headless runtime and host (M1);
  • real-extension runs (M2);
  • API coverage (M3);
  • terminal client (M4);
  • the embeddable engine (M5): in-process API and blast serve with a schema, client-core views over the wire, capability registry, native handlers, lean per-extension dependency installs, npm release build;
  • evidence at scale (M6): latest-API tracking, a sandboxed corpus sweep with primary-action probes, Suspense and use(), dependencies as part of launch (decision 0012), the Go example on views, TUI polish, and pre-releases via npm trusted publishing (docs/release.md).
  • real examples (M7, in progress): an AppKit launcher over blast serve (examples/macos-launcher), walkthroughs, paste closeMainWindow, macOS window operations without yabai, and an in-process web launcher (examples/web-launcher);
  • extensions in the browser (M8): run a Raycast extension from its GitHub URL with nothing installed, inside almostnode's cross-origin sandbox (decision 0013, examples/browser-demo).
• Engine size: about 13 MiB installed without the optional shared libraries.
• Next: more real embedder examples. Backlog in PLAN.md, "Later".

Two ways to embed

In process (JS/TS: Node 24, Bun, Electron).

import { createEngine } from "@blastlauncher/host"; // published as @blastlauncher/engine
import { createController } from "@blastlauncher/client-core";

const engine = createEngine({ handlers: { "clipboard.copy": (p) => myClipboard(p) } });
const extension = engine.openExtension({ extensionDir: "./my-extension" });
await extension.dependencies.install();
const { session } = await extension.launch("index");

const controller = createController({ platform: "macOS" });
session.scenes((scene) => apply(controller.scene(scene)));
controller.subscribe((view) => draw(view)); // rows, actions, search, toasts…
// apply(): send result.events to session.sendEvent, run result.effects

Out of process (any language). Spawn blast serve and speak versioned NDJSON over stdio: open extensions, launch commands, receive scenes or view models, send input, answer capability requests. See the JSON Schema and the Go example.

Full guide: docs/embedding.md.

Packages

Package	What it is
host	The engine: bundling, dependency installs, sessions, capability registry
runtime	Runs one command: React reconciler + the @raycast/api implementation
protocol	Message types, capability catalog, embedder protocol and schema
client-core	Framework-free Raycast client behaviour and the UI controller
serve	blast serve, the engine over stdio
native	Optional OS handlers for macOS, Windows and Linux (clipboard, open, …)
shared-deps	Optional fallback copies of common extension libraries
cli	blast run, a headless debug client
tui	A terminal reference client (OpenTUI, Bun)

The engine core is platform-free: OS actions are capabilities your app answers, or that you hand to @blastlauncher/native (decision 0010).

Try it

Requires Bun and Node.js 24.

bun install --frozen-lockfile
bun run blast run fixtures/extensions/hello-list index   # headless scene dump
bun run tui path/to/extension                            # terminal client
bun run blast:serve                                      # engine over stdio

Development

bun run verify          # the only gate: format, lint, types, compat, protocol, workflow, tests
bun run release:build   # npm tarballs into .cache/release (publishing: docs/release.md)

• Architecture · Capabilities · CLI · TUI · Decisions
• Cut a v3 prerelease
• Plan, milestones and backlog
• Contributor and agent workflow

History

Blast v1 was an Electron launcher that ran Raycast extensions, published as the @blastlauncher/cli, runtime, api, renderer and utils npm packages (1.x). Its last app release is v0.0.14 (August 2023), and its final source is f713dd6 on main. v3 is a from-scratch rewrite and an ongoing personal experiment, not a product.

License

MIT