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AgentZero

Always-On Agent in 5 Minutes

Get an always-on AI agent responding on a messaging platform with file access, shell commands, and web search. Total time: about 5 minutes.

1. Install

Section titled “1. Install”
Terminal window
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/auser/agentzero/main/scripts/install.sh | bash

2. Get a Telegram bot token

Section titled “2. Get a Telegram bot token”

Open Telegram, message @BotFather, send /newbot, follow the prompts. Copy the bot token it gives you.

3. Set your API key

Section titled “3. Set your API key”

OpenRouter gives you access to all models with one key:

Terminal window
export OPENAI_API_KEY="sk-or-v1-..."

Or save it permanently:

Terminal window
echo 'OPENAI_API_KEY=sk-or-v1-...' >> ~/.agentzero/.env

4. Create the config

Section titled “4. Create the config”

Save this as agentzero.toml in your working directory:

[provider]
kind = "openrouter"
model = "anthropic/claude-sonnet-4-6"


[security]
allowed_root = "."
allowed_commands = ["ls", "pwd", "cat", "echo", "grep", "find", "git", "cargo", "python3", "node"]
enable_git = true


[security.write_file]
enabled = true


[web_search]
enabled = true
provider = "duckduckgo"


[channels.telegram]
bot_token = "YOUR_TELEGRAM_BOT_TOKEN"


[gateway]
port = 42617

Replace YOUR_TELEGRAM_BOT_TOKEN with the token from step 2.

5. Start the agent

Section titled “5. Start the agent”
Terminal window
agentzero daemon start

Check it’s running:

Terminal window
agentzero daemon status

6. Message your bot

Section titled “6. Message your bot”

Open Telegram, find your bot, send a message. The agent will respond with full tool access — it can read files, run commands, search the web, and write files in your working directory.

Use Discord or Slack instead

Section titled “Use Discord or Slack instead”

Replace the [channels.telegram] block with one of these:

Discord

Section titled “Discord”
[channels.discord]
bot_token = "YOUR_DISCORD_BOT_TOKEN"

Create a bot at the Discord Developer Portal, enable the Message Content intent, and invite it to your server.

Slack

Section titled “Slack”
[channels.slack]
bot_token = "xoxb-YOUR-SLACK-BOT-TOKEN"
app_token = "xapp-YOUR-SLACK-APP-TOKEN"

Create a Slack app at api.slack.com/apps with Socket Mode enabled.

Use a local model (no API key)

Section titled “Use a local model (no API key)”

Swap the provider section and drop the API key:

[provider]
kind = "ollama"
model = "llama3.1:8b"

Make sure Ollama is running locally first (ollama serve).

Enable more tools

Section titled “Enable more tools”

Add any of these to your agentzero.toml:

# Browser automation
[browser]
enabled = true


# MCP servers (define servers in ~/.agentzero/mcp.json)
[security.mcp]
enabled = true


# HTTP requests
[http_request]
enabled = true

Next steps

Section titled “Next steps”