by NeuZhou
Source code teardowns of 15 AI coding agents. What is actually inside Claude Code, Dify, OpenHands, Cline, MemPalace, oh-my-codex, Goose, Codex CLI, and 7 more. Architecture diagrams, design patterns. Every claim fact-checked.
# Add to your Claude Code skills
git clone https://github.com/NeuZhou/awesome-ai-anatomyGuides for using ai agents skills like awesome-ai-anatomy.
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NEW: AgentSentinel -- We went from studying agent anatomy to protecting it. A zero-trust local proxy that monitors, secures, and records every decision your AI agent makes. Built from the security findings of our 16+ agent teardowns.
npx agent-sentinel start
Claude Code hides 18 virtual pet species inside production code that runs on your machine. MemPalace got 30K stars in 4 days - with 7,600 lines of Python. oh-my-codex runs 30 AI agents in parallel using git worktrees for isolation. None of this is in the docs. We found it by reading every file.
15 AI agent projects dissected - architecture diagrams, design patterns, and the engineering decisions nobody documents.
The 5 findings people can't stop sharing:
| # | Finding | Project | Why It Matters |
|---|---------|---------|---------------|
| 1 | Claude Code ships 18 virtual pet species - a full tamagotchi system hidden in a coding agent | Claude Code | What else is hiding in tools you run with sudo? |
| 2 | Pi Mono's "stealth mode" mirrors Claude Code tool names for provider compatibility | Pi Mono | Open-source projects gaming API providers is a trend |
| 3 | MiroFish's "collective intelligence" = LLM social simulation - agents role-playing humans on a simulated social network | MiroFish | 50K stars driven by a compelling vision of agent-based prediction |
| 4 | Lightpanda's bitcast dispatch makes Zig act like a language with vtables - a systems trick we'd never seen before | Lightpanda | Zig comptime metaprogramming pushed to its limits |
| 5 | DeerFlow's orphan tool call bug - 93 lines of code fix a crash that affects every LangGraph-based agent | DeerFlow | If you use LangGraph, you probably have this bug too |
These are real findings from reading source code, not vibes from README files.
Ever wondered how Claude Code manages its context window? Or why Codex CLI chose Rust and built a 17K-line sandbox? These teardowns answer questions like that by reading the actual source code.
15 AI agent source code analyses - from orchestration frameworks to coding assistants.
On mobile? Scroll right to see all columns, or tap a project name to read the full teardown.
| # | Project | Stars | Language | Lines | Key Findings | Status |
|---|---------|-------|----------|-------|-------------|--------|
| 001 | Dify | 136K | Python + TS | 1.24M | graphon engine, 7+ containers, 30+ vector DBs | Published |
| 002 | Claude Code | 109K | TypeScript | 510K | 4-layer context, hidden pet system (18 species) | Published |
| 003 | Browser Use | 87K | Python | 53K | Raw CDP over Playwright, DOM pipeline beats screenshots 5x, skills system, custom Chromium fork | NEW |
| 004 | OpenHands | 71K | Python + TS | 400K | 10 condensers, 3-layer security, 487-line stuck detector | Published |
| 005 | Cline | 60K | TypeScript | 560K | 3,756-line God Object, 40+ providers, YOLO mode, hooks system | Published |
| 006 | DeerFlow | 58K | Python + TS | 180K | 14-layer middleware, hash loop kill@5, no RBAC | Published |
| 007 | MiroFish | 50K | Python + Vue | 39K | LLM social simulation engine for collective intelligence | Published |
| 008 | Goose | 37K | Rust + TS | 198K | MCP-first bus, 5-inspector pipeline, 30+ LLMs | Published |
| 009 | Pi Mono | 32K | TypeScript | 147K | Game-engine arch, stealth mode as Claude Code | Published |
| 010 | MemPalace | 30K | Python | 9K | Milla Jovovich's 4-layer memory palace, AAAK dialect debunked | Published |
| 011 | OpenAI Codex CLI | 27K | Rust | 549K | Queue-pair arch, Guardian AI approval, 3-OS sandbox | Published |
| 012 | Lightpanda | 27K | Zig + Rust | 91K | From-scratch browser for AI agents, 9x Chrome | Published |
| 013 | Hermes Agent | 26K | Python | 260K | Self-improving skills, FTS5 search, frozen mem | Published |
| 014 | oh-my-claudecode | 24K | TypeScript | 194K | 19-agent team via file IPC, Haiku→Opus routing | Published |
| 015 | oh-my-codex | 19.5K | TypeScript | 124K | 30 agents, git worktrees, plugin hook SDK, autoresearch loops | Published |
| 016 | Guardrails AI | 6.6K | Python | 18K | Validator Hub, reask self-correction loop | Published |
Projects sorted by GitHub stars (descending).
Interactive Comparison Tool - filter, search, and compare projects side by side.
We maintain a detailed COMPARISON.md with side-by-side analysis across all 16 projects:
We also have a CROSS-CUTTING.md - a deep horizontal analysis covering:
| Other "awesome" lists | This repo | |----------------------|-----------| | Curate links and descriptions | Dissect repos | | "What they use" | Why they chose it | | Overview metrics | Architecture diagrams + trade-off analysis | | High-level overviews | Detailed engineering analysis with code references | | Praise everything | Reveal engineering decisions and trade-offs |
Beyond individual teardowns, we maintain cross-cutting analysis:
Have a project in mind? → Suggest a teardown
Found an error? Have a better analysis? PRs welcome.
New teardown every Tuesday.
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