This is a starter template for building AI agents using strands and CopilotKit. It provides a modern Next.js application with an integrated investment analyst agent that can research stocks, analyze market data, and provide investment insights.

Prerequisites

Node.js 20+
Python 3.12+
uv (Python package manager)
OpenAI API Key (for the strands agent)
Any of the following package managers:
- npm (default)
- pnpm
- yarn
- bun

Getting Started

Install dependencies using your preferred package manager:

# Using npm (default)
npm install

# Using pnpm
pnpm install

# Using yarn
yarn install

# Using bun
bun install

Note: Installing the package dependencies will also install the agent's python dependencies via the install:agent script.

Set up your OpenAI API key:

export OPENAI_API_KEY="your-openai-api-key-here"

or create a .env file.

echo "OPENAI_API_KEY=your-openai-api-key-here" > .env

Start the development server:

# Using npm (default)
npm run dev

# Using pnpm
pnpm dev

# Using yarn
yarn dev

# Using bun
bun run dev

This will start both the UI and agent servers concurrently.

Available Scripts

The following scripts can also be run using your preferred package manager:

dev - Starts both UI and agent servers in development mode
dev:ui - Starts only the Next.js UI server
dev:agent - Starts only the strands agent server
build - Builds the Next.js application for production
start - Starts the production server
install:agent - Installs Python dependencies for the agent

📚 Documentation

The main UI component is in src/app/page.tsx. You can:

Modify the theme colors and styling
Add new frontend actions
Customize the CopilotKit sidebar appearance

Otherwise, check out the documentation relevant to your task:

Strands Documentation - Learn more about Strands and its features
CopilotKit Documentation - Explore CopilotKit's capabilities
Next.js Documentation - Learn about Next.js features and API

Contributing

Feel free to submit issues and enhancement requests! This starter is designed to be easily extensible.

License

This project is licensed under the MIT License - see the LICENSE file for details.

Troubleshooting

Agent Connection Issues

If you see "I'm having trouble connecting to my tools", make sure:

The strands agent is running on port 8000
Your OpenAI API key is set correctly
Both servers started successfully

Python Dependencies

If you encounter Python import errors:

cd agent
uv sync

CopilotKit Intelligence & Threads (Optional)

CopilotKit Intelligence adds durable thread history and cross-session memory to your agent. It requires a COPILOTKIT_LICENSE_TOKEN and a running local Intelligence stack (Docker Desktop + a local Intelligence repo checkout).

Prerequisites

Docker Desktop running
A COPILOTKIT_LICENSE_TOKEN (obtain from CopilotKit Cloud)
The Intelligence repo cloned locally. The docker-compose.intelligence.yml defaults to a sibling directory at ../../../Intelligence relative to this starter; override with the INTELLIGENCE_REPO env var if your checkout is elsewhere.

Start the intelligence stack

# From inside this starter directory:
docker compose -f docker-compose.intelligence.yml up -d --wait

First run builds the intelligence image from source (may take several minutes).

Verify the stack is healthy

docker compose -f docker-compose.intelligence.yml ps

All three services (postgres, redis, intelligence) should show healthy.

Set environment variables

Add the following to your .env file:

COPILOTKIT_LICENSE_TOKEN=your-license-token-here
INTELLIGENCE_API_URL=http://localhost:4207
INTELLIGENCE_GATEWAY_WS_URL=ws://localhost:4407

Then start the dev server as usual (npm run dev). Thread history and memory features are activated automatically when COPILOTKIT_LICENSE_TOKEN is set.

Stop / reset

# Stop without removing data:
docker compose -f docker-compose.intelligence.yml down

# Full reset (removes postgres + redis volumes):
docker compose -f docker-compose.intelligence.yml down -v