aesel

make media easily

Mac beta

Apple silicon · macOS 14+

Windows beta

Windows 10/11 · x64 · hosted engine

curl -fsSL https://prompt.ac/aesel.sh | sh

the terminal harness, then type a

Aesel in a terminal: the prompt “a meadow of soft pastel flowers swaying in a breeze”, the engine’s reply, the live piece in a wood-framed preview, and @jeffrey/vili v2 on the status line — A session in the terminal, with the live piece in its frame.

The finished p5.js meadow running on Aesthetic Computer: pastel flowers and a bee under a soft sky — The `.p5` piece it made, running on Aesthetic Computer.

Where it sits

your machine

aesel

terminal a · Mac · Windows · iPhone · aesel.app/try

holds the conversation and the files

the workspace

.aesel/ on this disk: transcript, revisions v1 → vn, artifacts

/rollback adds, never erases

tools the brain holds

ac_api ac_examples ac_outline ac_preview ac_frame

the preview writes its pixels back here

made here, kept here

papers in XeLaTeX · Game Boy ROMs with GBDK · synthesized sound · brush-step pictures

aesthetic computer

Cloudflare

DNS · proxy · cache for aesthetic.computer prompt.ac aesel.app

lithlith.aesthetic.computer

one Express monolith behind Caddy on a DigitalOcean VPS

inference relay/api/easel-inference

model allowlist · braincells: a daily allowance, then a wallet

live channel/api/easel-live

Redis · every save, pushed to whoever is watching

publish/api/register-piece

a presigned PUT to your bucket · @you/name

transcripts/api/easel-transcripts

MongoDB · shared with AC to improve Aesel

picture tools/api/easel-image

OpenAI or fal · five a day

sign-inhi.aesthetic.computer

Auth0 · one @handle everywhere

top-ups

Stripe · in-app · Tezos

releases

prompt.ac/aesel.sh · self-update · DMG · EXE

the piece, live

aesthetic.computer/@you/name

Spaces

your bucket · CDN

brains

AC hosteddefault

OpenRouter on AC's account: Claude Opus and Sonnet 5.5 · Luna · DeepSeek · Kimi · Qwen · MiniMax

nothing to install; metered in braincells

your Claude account

the claude CLI on your machine

your Codex account

the codex CLI on your machine

open

OpenRouter with your own key · open-weight models

personal relay

help.aesthetic.computer

anywhere

any phone

scans the QR, joins the channel; each save arrives and hot-reloads

httpsbrain streamlive channelsign-inSurveyed 2026-11-08 from the source · paper version

A session

Pick a start. A blank Aesthetic Computer piece, or a nopaint.art brush.
Describe it. Plain words. The engine writes the code and reads the canvas back to check its work.
Watch it. A QR code opens the piece on any phone, and every save arrives there live.
Keep it. Signed in, each save publishes to aesthetic.computer/@you/name. /versions lists them; /rollback adds, never erases.

Four runtimes

Pick with /runtime or --runtime. All four push live and publish to your @handle.

.mjs

Aesthetic Computer

JavaScript against AC’s own API: paint, wipe, ink, sound, input, multiplayer.

function paint({ wipe }) {
  wipe("pink");
}
export { paint };

.lisp

KidLisp

AC’s small Lisp for generative art — a whole piece in a line.

(wipe "pink")
(ink "yellow")
(circle 128 128 64)

.p5

p5.js processing

Real p5.js, the Processing most people already write — running inside an AC piece.

function setup() {
  createCanvas(windowWidth, windowHeight);
}
function draw() {
  background(255, 184, 220);
}

.l5

L5

Aesthetic Computer’s own Processing, in Lua.

-- moss
function draw()
  background(255, 184, 220)
  circle(width / 2, height / 2, 64)
end

Supported MIMEs

Pieces are the heart of it. /medium turns the same conversation toward other kinds of work.

medium	formats	what you get
piece	`application/javascript` `text/x-lisp` `.p5` `.l5`	a live, published Aesthetic Computer piece
brush	`application/javascript`	a nopaint.art brush; the painting, undo and zoom come with it
picture	`image/png` `image/jpeg` `image/webp`	a layered 512 × 512 picture; each accepted change adds a layer
sound	`audio/wav` `audio/mpeg` `audio/ogg`	a score on a shared beat grid, synthesized
paper	`application/pdf` `text/plain`	an archival LaTeX paper with its source inside
Game Boy	`application/x-gameboy-rom`	a real ROM, built and checked, playing in AC’s emulator

Anything up to 8 MiB can go to mime.ac under your @handle: aesthetic mime file "caption".

Brains

AC hosted Nothing to install. Paid in braincells on your @handle; the first launch starts here.

Claude · Codex Bring your own subscription through its CLI.

OpenRouter Bring your own key for open models.

Switch any time with /backend and /model. Outside a piece, Aesel is a general harness that runs with your own settings, skills and MCP servers.

Use aesel by…

downloading it for Mac

aesel-0.8.19-arm64.dmg ↓

Apple silicon, macOS 14+. Drag it to Applications, open it and sign in with your Aesthetic Computer account. aesel opens it from a terminal.

downloading it for Windows

aesel-0.8.19-windows-x64-setup.exe ↓

Windows 10/11 on x64 with the WebView2 Runtime. Hosted brain only. The installer is unsigned, so SmartScreen may warn first.

installing it in a terminal

curl -fsSL https://prompt.ac/aesel.sh | sh

Links a, ac and aesel. Type a to start; /update keeps it current.

opening it in a browser

aesel.app/try

Nothing to install. Sign in, describe a piece and play it as it takes shape; edits publish to your @handle.

typing a word into Aesthetic Computer

aesthetic.computer

Type a word the prompt doesn't know and Aesel sketches it in KidLisp, with a tune, then runs it under a new $code.

reading the install card in AC

prompt.ac/aesel

The same one-line install as a piece, for whoever is already at the prompt. Tap the line to copy it.

Conversation context goes to the brain that writes your work. Pieces publish to your @handle; notebooks and versions stay on your device. Privacy policy