Scaffold your project

After you create an agent in the dashboard, scaffold the bridge application that receives events and runs your handler code.

Scaffold with the CLI

Open a terminal in the directory where you want the project, then run:

npx novu@latest init -t agent \
 --agent-identifier <AGENT_IDENTIFIER> \
 -s <NOVU_SECRET_KEY> \
 -a <NOVU_API_URL>

The CLI prompts for a project name and creates a starter app. The dashboard also provides a pre-filled copy of this command on the agent setup page with your secret key and API URL already filled in.

What gets created

A typical scaffold produces a Next.js app with:

app/
  api/novu/route.ts    # exposes your agents over HTTP
  novu/
    agents/
      index.ts         # re-exports each agent
      support-agent.tsx # starter handler (name may vary)

The /api/novu route is the bridge endpoint. Register it in the dashboard under your agent's bridge URL settings.

Run locally

You have scaffolded a project with a dev script that runs the bridge application. To run the scaffolded project in local machine:

1. On the agent detail page, set bridge to Local.
2. In the project directory terminal, run:

npx novu@latest dev --port <bridge_application_port> --no-studio

--port is where your app listens (often 3000 or 4000). The CLI tunnels to /api/novu and registers the URL in Novu.

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