# Saadman Rafat

> Personal site and technical blog of Saadman Rafat (A. M. Saadman Rafat), a Senior AI Systems & MLOps Architect specializing in LLM productionization, agentic workflows, and Python tooling. Author of [Halfhand](https://halfhand.org), a local-first Rust CLI that records and replays AI coding agent sessions.

Saadman Rafat writes about Python packaging, AI agent tooling, MCP (Model Context Protocol), LLM engineering, and developer infrastructure. All posts are original, dated, and tagged; full-text search and an RSS feed are available.

## Tools

- [Halfhand](https://halfhand.org): A local-first Rust CLI flight recorder for AI coding agents (Claude Code, Claude Desktop, OpenAI Codex CLI, Google Gemini CLI). Records terminal output, file diffs, and structured agent events to a local SQLite database with zero network calls; replay faithfully in a TUI or inspect non-interactively. Source: https://github.com/halfhandorg/halfhand
- [Arkterm](https://github.com/saadmanrafat/arkterm): An open-source AI-native shell terminal that wires an LLM directly into the Linux command line.

## Blog

- [Halfhand: The Flight Recorder for Your AI Coding Agents](https://saadman.dev/blog/2026-07-23-halfhand-the-flight-recorder-for-your-ai-coding-agents/): Introducing Halfhand (hh), a local-first Rust CLI that records AI coding agent sessions and replays them faithfully, with zero network calls.
- [The Modern Way to Install Python CLI Tools Globally Without Breaking PEP 668 Compliance](https://saadman.dev/blog/2025-08-10-the-modern-way-to-install-python-cli-tools-globally-without-breaking-pep-668-compliance/): Using pipx, uv, and other modern methods to install Python CLI tools globally while staying PEP 668 compliant.
- [AI's New Frontier: Reimagining Your Terminal with Intelligent Agents](https://saadman.dev/blog/2025-06-26-reimagining-your-terminal-with-intelligent-agents/): A look at Google Gemini CLI, Arkterm, and Warp.dev, and how AI is transforming the command-line experience.
- [Ten Actually Useful Open Source LLM Tools You Should Know (2025 Edition)](https://saadman.dev/blog/2025-06-09-ten-actually-useful-open-source-llm-tool-you-should-know-2025-edition/): A curated list of production-ready, privacy-respecting open-source LLM tools, from Langfuse to Continue.
- [Shell Shocked: Wire an LLM Directly into Your Linux Terminal](https://saadman.dev/blog/2025-05-31-shell-shocked-wire-llm-directly-in-linux-terminal/): Building Arkterm, an AI-powered terminal assistant using Groq's LLM API.
- [Deta Surf: Reclaim Your Digital World](https://saadman.dev/blog/2025-05-20-deta-surf-reclaim-your-digital-world/): A look at Deta Surf, a browser rethinking digital organization with AI and local-first principles.
- [Seeing the World: A Beginner's Guide to CNNs using PyTorch](https://saadman.dev/blog/2025-05-21-seeing-the-world-a-beginners-guide-to-convolution-neural-networks-using-pytorch/): An introduction to Convolutional Neural Networks using PyTorch.
- [The Reason pip Suddenly Refuses to Install Globally](https://saadman.dev/blog/2025-05-15-the-reason-pip-refuses-to-install-globally/): Explaining PEP 668 and externally managed Python environments.
- [A No-Nonsense Guide to UV (a Python Package Manager)](https://saadman.dev/blog/2025-05-15-a-no-nonsense-guide-to-uv-a-python-package-manager/): An overview of uv, a fast all-in-one Python package and environment manager.

## Optional

- [Full blog index](https://saadman.dev/blog/): All posts, newest first.
- [RSS feed](https://saadman.dev/rss.xml): Machine-readable feed of all posts.
- [Sitemap](https://saadman.dev/sitemap.xml): Full site sitemap with per-post images.
- [Search](https://saadman.dev/search/): Full-text search over all posts.
- [GitHub](https://github.com/saadmanrafat): Source code and open-source projects.