Voice-first AI pair programming across Cursor, Claude Code, and Cline

Drive Mode

You steer. The right specialist surfaces. Drive Mode is the open-source, local-first product family at drivemode.ai: Cursor Drive, Claude Code Drive, and Cline Drive (cline-drivecode).

Prototype

Harrison Halperin

Systems

Multi-agent systemsOperators, tangents, and recruitable agents coordinate inside one Drive call without collapsing into a single shared chat blob.

TypeScriptCursor Drive, the Cline Drive hub and TUI surfaces, and the shared protocol packages are TypeScript over each host's exposed contracts.

MCPLocal MCP bridges let operators update UI and state when a host's chat surface is closed or incomplete.

Agent orchestrationA cleaned prompt pipeline and sub-modes (Plan, Agent, Ask, Debug) shape how work reaches the model before any turn runs.

Voice interfacesDrive treats speech in and out as a first-class product surface with its own failure modes, wake phrases, and BYOK speech providers.

Agent guardrailsRole-based operator permissions, worktree isolation, and human-governed approvals bound what each specialist may do.

Developer toolsDrive is a local-first pairing layer you run beside Cursor, Claude Code, or Cline, not a hosted black-box orchestrator.

GitNamed operators fork into isolated worktrees so parallel Drive work stays reviewable before it lands on a shared branch.

CLIThe Claude Code daemon and the Cline Drive interactive TUI make the same call-shaped loop available without an IDE chrome.

AgenticAgents narrate and propose inside a human-steered call. Approvals and merge authority stay with the operator.

PythonHook and classifier edges on the Claude Code lineage include Python where the daemon needs it.

CI/CDOperator worktrees stay behind normal git review. Drive is not a merge actor.

TestingUnit and browser specs cover pipeline, registry, and hub behavior before Extension Host or hub integration runs.

SQLiteLocal-first room and status state land in on-disk SQLite, not a Drive-operated cloud warehouse.

Local-firstDrive itself keeps the loop on disk. No Drive-operated prompt warehouse, and privacy-strict defaults.

Session log

Project brief

Prototype

Problem

Turn-based agent chat fails the moment work is long or parallel, because you cannot see what is happening now or interrupt cleanly.

Outcome

An open-source Drive Mode family at drivemode.ai: Cursor Drive, Claude Code Drive, and Cline Drive (cline-drivecode), so you stay on a call with specialists, see their work, and steer Plan, Agent, Ask, or Debug under human-governed approvals.

Evidence

drivemode.ai ships the public product face for three hosts under Quant-H2, with local-first, no Drive-operated cloud brain, privacy-strict defaults, and human-governed approvals called out as product constraints.
Cline Drive lives in github.com/hhalperin/cline-drivecode as pre-1.0 open source: Hub Drive tab, Spotlight shared surface, Status Hub (Board, Changelog, Dependency map), interactive TUI join/leave, and a hub-owned three-lane room partition (event log, live snapshot, facets).
The earlier Cursor IDE build was the larger of the two pairing lineages (58 TypeScript files, roughly 12k lines, 54 MCP tools, 24 ADRs, 57 Jest suites, 4 browser specs); about 60% of that implementation later ported back into the Claude Code daemon lineage.

Key decisions

Product family: One Drive idea across Cursor, Claude Code, and Cline, published at drivemode.ai, instead of three unrelated voice demos.
Pair, do not replace: Agents are means. The engineer stays interruptible and owns approvals.
Hub as single writer: Cline Drive keeps room truth in the hub. Clients publish facts and render projections.
Local-first privacy: Drive itself does not operate a prompt warehouse. Speech providers are BYOK.

3Hosts1Product siteHub+TUICline Drive58TS files54MCP tools~60%Ported back

Three hosts, one product

Drive Mode is the product family behind drivemode.ai: voice-first AI pair programming for Cursor, Claude Code, and Cline. You speak or type the work. Wake phrases and a cleaned pipeline keep noise out of the session. Specialists surface as operators for parallel work and tangents for side questions, without derailing the main thread. You steer Plan, Agent, Ask, or Debug with approval gates. It is pair programming, not a full-autonomy "AI engineer," and not an agent orchestrator that replaces the engineer. Cursor Drive is the marketplace plugin plus optional VSIX companion: continuous listening, multi-operator pairing, Agent Screen, and a nine-stage prompt pipeline over Cursor's closed chrome. Claude Code Drive is the daemon lineage: think out loud, with curator threads, operators, and tangents routing the right specialist. Cline Drive (github.com/hhalperin/cline-drivecode) is the pre-1.0 open-source host build: a Discord-shaped call inside the Cline Hub, a Spotlight shared surface for work cards and human pins, a Status Hub (Board, Changelog, Dependency map), and the same Drive join/leave loop in an interactive TUI. The hub is the single writer for room state. Clients only project. Roughly 60% of the earlier Cursor IDE build ported back into the Claude Code daemon lineage. Status is open-source work in progress under Quant-H2, not a finished marketplace suite on every host. The collaboration harness names the pure policy layer this stack needs. Local-first orchestration keeps the loop on disk. Edit vs merge still applies when operators share a machine. Adjacent tooling includes Modular Orchestration System, Agent CI/CD, and Spire.

Product site drivemode.ai

Cline Drive source github.com/hhalperin/cline-drivecode

How it works

Three host builds share one product idea. Cursor and Claude Code carry the earlier dual-lineage pairing stack. Cline Drive adds a hub-owned call with Spotlight and Status Hub. Every prompt still routes through a cleaned pipeline before any model call.

Drive Mode product family

Drive Modedrivemode.ai · Quant-H2voice-first pair programming, not autonomy theater

IDE Drivemarketplace plugin + VSIXvoice, multi-operator, Agent Screen

CLI Drivedaemon + hookscurator threads, operators, tangents

Hub Drivecline-drivecode · pre-1.0Hub call, Spotlight, Status Hub, TUI

Shared defaultslocal-first · BYOK speechno Drive-operated prompt warehouse

One product idea, three hosts. drivemode.ai is the public face. Each host keeps its own chrome while sharing local-first, human-governed defaults.

Hub Drive call stack

1ClientsDrive tab · Spotlight · Status Hub · TUI

2Hub daemongatesingle writer · discovered port

3Room lanesevent log · RoomSnapshot · facets

4Drive kernelsub-modes · narration · topology · BYOK

5Agent coresessions · tools · status.db

Browser Hub UI and CLI TUI both project the same hub daemon. The hub is the only writer for room events, live snapshot, and durable facets.

IDE and CLI pairing layers

1User surfacesvoice · terminal · slash · status

2Observe hookssession lifecycle events

3Prompt pipelinegateclassify · sanitize · route

4MCP + operatorstools · worktrees · gates

5Agent SDKmodel invocation

6Local stateSQLite · JSON · worktrees

Surfaces and hooks enter a cleaned pipeline. Operators run in isolated worktrees against the agent SDK. State lands in local SQLite and JSON.

Product sitedrivemode.ai positions Drive as voice-first pair programming for Cursor, Claude Code, and Cline, with local-first and privacy-strict defaults.

Three hostsIDE Drive and CLI Drive carry the dual-lineage pairing stack. Hub Drive (cline-drivecode) is the hub-call build with Spotlight and Status Hub.

Collaboration boundaryThe hub proposes nothing authoritative from clients. Room ownership stays with one writer. Apps only project, matching the collaboration-harness split.

What it is notNot an agent orchestrator that replaces the engineer, not full-autonomy AI engineer theater, and not a cloud that stores your prompts for Drive.