Self-hosted project management for people who work with AI agents.
I built Kanbu because I use OpenClaw every day. My projects regularly cross 300,000 lines of code — and at that scale, you need somewhere to track what your agents are doing, what's been decided, and what comes next. No tool did that. So I built one.
Kanbu connects directly to your local OpenClaw gateway. Dispatch any task to an agent from the task view, read its response, steer it with follow-up instructions, and let it update the board as it works. Your task list becomes the shared memory between you and your agents.
Works with any MCP-compatible agent — OpenClaw, Claude Code, Cursor, or any tool that speaks MCP.
It's MIT. It's self-hosted. It's here because I needed it, and maybe you do too.
Most project management tools are either too simple (Trello) or too complex (Jira). And none of them understand AI-native workflows.
Kanbu is different:
| Problem | Kanbu Solution |
|---|---|
| "I need fine-grained permissions but Trello doesn't have them" | Scoped ACL with inheritance, deny rules, and security groups |
| "I want AI to help but it can't access my tasks" | 154 MCP tools - Claude Code works directly in your board |
| "I want to dispatch tasks to AI agents and see what they do" | OpenClaw agent dispatch — one click, agent runs, response logged |
| "GitHub issues and my PM tool are never in sync" | Bi-directional GitHub sync with webhook integration |
| "I want to self-host but lose features" | No seat fees, no feature gates — everything included, always |
| "My backups are not secure or automated" | Automated backups with AES-256-GCM encryption & scheduling |
| "My team speaks different languages" | Each user talks to their own AI assistant in their own language |
- Kanban boards with drag-and-drop, swimlanes, and WIP limits
- Multiple views: Board, List, Calendar, Timeline
- Sprints & Milestones with burndown charts
- Time tracking with estimates vs. actuals
- Real-time collaboration: Live cursors, typing indicators, and instant sync via Socket.io
Kanbu implements a permission system inspired by filesystem ACLs (think Windows NTFS / Active Directory, but for a web app).
- Granular permissions: Read, Write, Execute, Delete, Permissions — each independently grantable or deniable.
- Inheritance: Workspace → Project → Task permissions flow down automatically.
- Deny-first logic: Explicit deny overrides any grant (e.g., ban a specific user from a project even if they are an admin).
- Audit logs: Complete security trail with export to CSV/JSON.
Kanbu includes a wiki intelligence system built in TypeScript (33,000+ lines).
The base wiki runs without any extra services and includes:
- BM25 full-text search: Fast keyword search across all wiki pages
- Contradiction detection: Automatically flags conflicting information across your documentation
- Community clustering: Groups related knowledge using label propagation (own algorithm)
- Version history: Up to 20 versions per page, with restore
The full graph engine (optional, requires Python/FalkorDB via docker-compose.openclaw.yml) adds:
- Semantic search: Find knowledge using vector embeddings, not just keywords
- Temporal queries: Ask "What did we know about this feature last month?"
- Duplicate deduplication: Detects and merges overlapping knowledge nodes across pages
- RAG: Retrieval-Augmented Generation — AI answers grounded in your actual wiki content
- D3.js graph visualization: Interactive visual map of your knowledge graph, live in the browser
Inspired by Graphiti — thanks for the foundation.
If you run OpenClaw, Kanbu connects directly to your local agent gateway. Assign any task to an AI agent with one click — no copy-pasting, no context switching.
- One-click dispatch: Open any task → Agent tab → select agent → Dispatch
- Task context included automatically: Title, description, project and workspace name are sent as a structured prompt
- Custom instructions per run: Add extra steering without editing the task
- Run history with response: Every run is logged with status, duration, and the agent's full response
- Iterative control loop: Dispatch → read response → dispatch again with new instructions
- Fire-and-forget: Returns immediately, status updates async as the agent works
Setup (2 env vars):
OPENCLAW_GATEWAY_URL=http://127.0.0.1:18789
OPENCLAW_GATEWAY_TOKEN=your-token-hereWhen not configured, the Agent tab shows a friendly "not configured" state instead of an error.
Kanbu ships with a ready-made OpenClaw skill. Install it once, and your OpenClaw agent knows how to manage projects, tasks, wikis, and teams — no manual configuration needed.
# Copy the skill into your OpenClaw workspace
cp -r packages/openclaw-skill ~/.openclaw/workspace/skills/kanbu
# Restart your gateway
openclaw gateway restartThat's it. Your agent can now create tasks, move cards, add comments, search across projects, run analytics, and manage your entire board — all through natural language.
Connect any MCP-compatible AI agent to manage your Kanbu projects with 154 available tools.
Tool Categories:
| Phase | Category | Tools | Examples |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Pairing | 3 | kanbu_connect, kanbu_whoami, kanbu_disconnect |
| 2 | Core | 11 | kanbu_list_workspaces, kanbu_create_task |
| 3 | Subtasks & Comments | 9 | kanbu_create_subtask, kanbu_add_comment |
| 4 | Search & Activity | 5 | kanbu_search_tasks, kanbu_recent_activity |
| 5 | Analytics | 4 | kanbu_project_stats, kanbu_velocity |
| 6-12 | Admin & Settings | 90 | User management, ACL, Audit logs, Backups, Profile |
| 9+ | GitHub Connector | 10 | kanbu_list_github_prs, kanbu_create_github_branch |
| 17 | Wiki Management | 18 | kanbu_list_project_wiki_pages, kanbu_create_workspace_wiki_page |
| 13-16 | Hardening & Audit | 4 | Rate limiting, Security hardening |
- Bi-directional sync: Issues, PRs, commits, milestones
- Auto-link commits: Reference tasks in commit messages
- Sync logs: Complete visibility into what synced and when
Requires a GitHub App installed on your account or organization. Setup guide →
Complete backup solution with strong encryption:
- AES-256-GCM encryption at rest (optional, via
BACKUP_ENCRYPTION_KEY) - SHA-256 checksum verification to detect tampering or corruption
- Dual-mode PostgreSQL backup: Direct mode (network) or Docker mode (container exec)
- Scheduled backups with cron-style scheduling (internal or external triggers)
- Smart retention policies: Keep last N daily/weekly/monthly backups
- Database restore wizard with pre-restore backup and verification
- Webhook notifications with HMAC-SHA256 signed payloads
- Multi-instance support: Environment-based subdirectories for shared storage
| Layer | Technology |
|---|---|
| Frontend | React 19, TypeScript, Vite, Tailwind CSS, Shadcn/ui |
| State | Redux Toolkit, TanStack Query |
| Backend | Node.js 22, Fastify, tRPC 11, Socket.io |
| Database | PostgreSQL 15, Prisma ORM |
| Graph (optional) | Kanbu Graphiti (Python/FastAPI), FalkorDB — semantic search/RAG |
| Agent (optional) | OpenClaw gateway, @kanbu/openclaw-bridge |
| Monorepo | pnpm workspaces, Turborepo |
Which branch? Clone
mainfor the latest stable version. Thedevelopbranch contains unreleased features and may be unstable.
Choose your setup based on which features you need:
| Option | Command | Includes |
|---|---|---|
| Basic | docker compose -f docker/docker-compose.selfhosted.yml up -d |
PostgreSQL, API, Web UI |
| Full (with knowledge graph) | docker compose -f docker/docker-compose.full.yml up -d |
Everything above + FalkorDB, Graphiti, semantic search, D3 graph visualization |
Full install requires an OpenAI API key for knowledge graph embeddings and ~2GB RAM.
git clone https://github.com/hydro13/kanbu.git
cd kanbu/docker
cp .env.example .env
# Edit .env — CHANGE THE PASSWORDS AND JWT_SECRET!
docker compose -f docker-compose.selfhosted.yml up -d
# Open http://localhost:80Adds the Graphiti knowledge graph engine for semantic wiki search, contradiction detection, and D3 graph visualization. Requires an OpenAI API key.
git clone https://github.com/hydro13/kanbu.git
cd kanbu
cp docker/.env.example docker/.env
# Edit docker/.env — add OPENAI_API_KEY=sk-...
docker compose -f docker/docker-compose.full.yml up -d
# Open http://localhost:80# Prerequisites: Node.js 22+, PostgreSQL 15+, pnpm 9+
# macOS: brew install postgresql@16 && brew services start postgresql@16
# Linux: sudo apt install postgresql || sudo pacman -S postgresql
git clone https://github.com/hydro13/kanbu.git
cd kanbu
pnpm install
# Build workspace packages (required before starting apps)
pnpm build
# Setup environment
cp apps/api/.env.example apps/api/.env
cp apps/api/.env packages/shared/.env # needed for prisma
# Edit apps/api/.env — set DATABASE_URL and JWT_SECRET
# Setup database
cd packages/shared && pnpm db:generate && pnpm db:push && cd ../..
# Start everything
pnpm dev
# Open http://localhost:5173macOS note:
start.shworks on macOS (Apple Silicon and Intel). Docker Desktop or Colima is recommended for the PostgreSQL container, or usebrew install postgresql@16for a native install.
Add two lines to apps/api/.env (or docker/.env for Docker):
OPENCLAW_GATEWAY_URL=http://127.0.0.1:18789
OPENCLAW_GATEWAY_TOKEN=your-token-hereThen restart the API. The Agent tab will appear on every task.
If you use AI agents to write code — OpenClaw, Claude Code, Cursor, or anything MCP-compatible — this is built for you. Your feedback, bug reports, and ideas are the most valuable thing this project can get right now.
Ways to contribute:
- Try it and tell me what broke — open an issue
- Share your agent workflow — what context does your agent need that Kanbu doesn't send yet?
- Pick up a feature — check the roadmap for what's next
- Improve the Docker setup — make self-hosting easier for others
- Fix something that annoys you — PRs welcome, no permission needed
See CONTRIBUTING.md for setup instructions.
- 💬 Discord — ask questions, share what you're building
- 🐛 Issues — bug reports and feature requests
- 📋 Roadmap — what's planned and what's done
MIT — use it, fork it, build on it. No strings attached.
See LICENSE for details.
Built by Robin Waslander — an OpenClaw user who needed this to exist.