update

name	update
description	Restart Vellum services and rebuild the macOS app. Smart branch handling: pulls from main by default, restarts in-place on feature branches, or switches to a specified branch. Pass --pull to force-pull on the current branch.

Update - Restart Vellum (with Smart Branch Handling)

Restart Vellum services and rebuild the macOS app with branch-aware git behavior.

Arguments

The user may pass $ARGUMENTS to control branch behavior:

Invocation	Behavior
/update (no args, on main)	Pull latest from origin/main (default)
/update (no args, on a feature branch)	Skip git ops - restart with the current checkout
/update <branch>	Check out that branch, pull if it has a remote
/update --pull	Force pull on whatever branch you're currently on

Steps

0. Ensure Bun is on PATH:

   export PATH="$HOME/.bun/bin:$PATH"
   

1. Preflight snapshot - capture current state before making changes:

   vellum ps
   

2. Kill the macOS app and any stale file-watcher processes first (old build.sh run watchers will detect git-pulled Swift changes and bounce the app repeatedly). Use -f to match against the full command line, catching all environment variants (Vellum, Vellum Local, Vellum Dev, etc.):

   pkill -f "Vellum.*\.app/Contents/MacOS/" || true
   pkill -f "build\.sh run" || true
   

3. Quiesce with vellum sleep - stop assistant and gateway processes. This is directory-agnostic and stops processes globally regardless of CWD:

   vellum sleep || true
   

4. Verify stopped - run vellum ps and confirm no running processes. If vellum ps shows processes still running, run fallback cleanup to force-kill them:

   vellum ps
   

   Fallback cleanup if vellum ps confirms processes are still running:

   pkill -x "vellum-assistant" || true
   pkill -f "gateway/src/index" || true
   lsof -ti :7830 | xargs kill -9 2>/dev/null || true
   lsof -ti :7821 | xargs kill -9 2>/dev/null || true
   

   After fallback cleanup, run vellum ps again to confirm all processes are stopped.

5. Smart branch handling - determine what git operations (if any) to perform:

   CURRENT=$(git branch --show-current)
   GIT_OPS_RAN=false
   

   Case A - --pull flag: Force pull on the current branch.

   if [[ "$ARGUMENTS" == "--pull" ]]; then
     git pull
     GIT_OPS_RAN=true
   fi
   

   Case B - Explicit branch name provided: Check out the requested branch, pulling if possible. Before checking out, verify the working tree is clean - if there are uncommitted changes, stop and warn the user rather than silently losing work. Do NOT stash automatically.

   if [[ -n "$ARGUMENTS" && "$ARGUMENTS" != "--pull" ]]; then
     if ! git diff --quiet || ! git diff --cached --quiet; then
       echo "ERROR: Uncommitted changes detected. Commit or stash them before switching branches."
       # Stop and report the error to the user. Do not proceed.
     fi
     git checkout "$ARGUMENTS"
     git pull origin "$ARGUMENTS" 2>/dev/null || true
     GIT_OPS_RAN=true
   fi
   

   Case C - No args, on main: Pull latest from origin (preserves current default behavior).

   if [[ -z "$ARGUMENTS" && "$CURRENT" == "main" ]]; then
     git pull origin main
     GIT_OPS_RAN=true
   fi
   

   Case D - No args, on a feature branch: Skip git ops entirely - just restart with the current checkout.

   if [[ -z "$ARGUMENTS" && "$CURRENT" != "main" ]]; then
     echo "On branch '$CURRENT' - skipping git pull, restarting with current checkout"
   fi
   

6. Install dependencies - only if git operations ran (dependencies are unlikely to have changed for a local-only restart):

   if [[ "$GIT_OPS_RAN" == "true" ]]; then
     cd assistant && bun install && cd ..
     cd gateway && bun install && cd ..
   fi
   

7. Restart with vellum wake - start assistant and gateway from the current checkout. vellum wake must be run from the checkout directory that should supply the new assistant code:

   vellum wake
   

8. Build the macOS app (foreground, so compilation errors are caught immediately):

   cd clients/macos && ./build.sh
   

   If the build fails, stop and report the error. Do not proceed to launch.

   Then launch with file-watching in the background (the build is cached, so this just launches + watches):

   cd clients/macos && ./build.sh run &
   

9. Verify fresh state - run vellum ps to confirm processes are running:

   sleep 5
   echo ""
   echo "=== Startup Summary ==="
   vellum ps
   echo "======================="
   

Report

Tailor the report to what actually happened:

• If git pulled (Cases A, B, C): Report what was pulled (new commits), the branch, and whether dependencies were updated.
• If restarted in-place (Case D): Report that services were restarted on the current branch with no git changes.
• Always include: The startup summary block output (assistant health, gateway health), whether the macOS app build succeeded or failed (and the error if it failed).
• Note: the macOS app manages its own assistant and gateway. On first launch, the app will hatch and start them automatically.