SmartSpec

BetaWorks with Claude and ChatGPT

Your systems, designed with your own AI.

Download for Apple silicon Download for Intel Mac

SmartSpec is in beta, so it may change significantly from one version to the next.

Another agent

See the whole design at once, every item full size, with a line wherever two are linked. Pan and zoom across it.

Your AI designs the system as a schematic: diagrams, documents and tables, all linked. Arrange what you’re working on, and keep the rest to hand.

Step 1 · Ask

Say what to design

Open the chat and say what you want designed. It’s your own Claude or ChatGPT, signed in with your own account. A whole business, one service or one module: it’s the same.

Step 2 · Propose

Your AI proposes it

It reads what’s already designed and builds on it, embedding a schematic rather than describing it again. The proposal opens in SmartSpec by itself.

Step 3 · Comment

Press and hold to comment

On a box in a diagram, a row in a table, some words, or the schematic as a whole. Your comment stays exactly where you left it.

Step 4 · Revise

Your AI answers

Ask in the chat. It reads your comments, changes the proposal, and says how it dealt with each one. A tick means nothing more is needed.

Step 5 · Accept

Only you make it a draft

Read the answer, then accept. Every change, even a schematic’s first, waits for you.

Step 6 · Arrange

Work on more than one thing

Bring an item to the middle, drag others beside it, and resize them. The rest wait at the sides as cards. Your layout is kept on your Mac.

Step 7 · Overview

See it all at once

Switch to Overview for every item at full size, laid out around what links to what.

Step 8 · Build

Any agent can build from it

Another agent finds the plan and reads only what it needs, item by item, then gets on with building it.

Free and open source

SmartSpec is free. Completely.

No account, no trial, no paid plan. SmartSpec is released under the MIT licence, which means it stays free: once it’s out, nobody can take that back.

What’s the MIT licence?

It’s one of the most common licences for free software, written at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In plain terms:

  • Use it for anything

    At home or at work, for as long as you like. You never pay, and you never need permission.

  • See how it works

    All of SmartSpec’s code is public. Anyone can read it, copy it, or change it to suit them.

  • Just one condition

    Anyone who shares a copy keeps the licence with it. It comes as it is, without a guarantee.

Install

Install it, then choose your AI.

Three steps, and nothing to type in Terminal.

  1. Download SmartSpec

    Open the download and drag SmartSpec into your Applications folder.

    Apple silicon Intel Mac

  2. Open the chat

    Open SmartSpec, then open the chat with its button at the top right. Ask from home for a new schematic, or open one and ask about it.

  3. Choose Claude or ChatGPT

    Not set up yet? SmartSpec installs it with its maker’s own installer and opens their sign-in page. Sign in with your own account and you’re ready. SmartSpec never sees your sign-in.

Using another AI app?

Claude Desktop, Claude Code and any AI app that runs MCP servers can work in SmartSpec too. Connect yours below. After that, it opens SmartSpec by itself whenever it needs it.

Claude Desktop

SmartSpec adds itself.

  1. Open SmartSpec and click its status at the top left, with the coloured dot. It usually says Ready.
  2. Open Connect another AI app yourself and choose Add to Claude Desktop.
  3. Quit Claude Desktop and open it again. Then start a new chat and ask Claude to design a schematic.

If the button says Not running, another copy of SmartSpec is probably open: quit SmartSpec everywhere, then open it again. Or add it yourself: in Claude Desktop, open Settings → Developer → Edit Config, and add the entry from the Other AI apps tab.

Good to know

Your design, your AI.

  • Bring your own AI

    SmartSpec works with the Claude or ChatGPT account you already have, or the AI app you already use. No new account and no new subscription.

  • You have the final say

    Your AI proposes; you decide. Nothing becomes a draft until you accept it.

  • Any scale

    A whole business, one service or a single module: a schematic is the same at every level.

  • Diagrams as data

    Your AI sends the boxes and lines; SmartSpec lays them out and draws them, every time.

  • Standards, embedded

    Design something once, like service auth, and embed it wherever it’s used.

  • Read only what’s needed

    Agents see the outline first and fetch each item as they need it, so big plans stay cheap.

  • Nothing gets lost

    Every draft is kept. Step back to any of them whenever you like.

  • Kept on your Mac

    Your schematics and layouts stay on your computer, not in someone’s cloud.

  • Free and open source

    No sign-up and no plan to choose. Every line of SmartSpec is on GitHub.

Give your next system a plan any agent can follow.

Free for macOS, with Claude, ChatGPT and other AI apps. In beta, and still changing significantly.

Download for Apple silicon Download for Intel Mac