@juanmackie/pi-deepseek-peak

A small pi package that shows DeepSeek's scheduled PEAK/OFF-PEAK pricing phase and countdown in pi's default status bar. It also performs a lightweight authenticated DeepSeek account-health check using pi's existing DeepSeek credentials.

Author: JUAN MACKIE

Published package links: npm · GitHub · pi.dev

Quick start

Requirements: pi installed and Node.js >=22.19.0.

1. Install the published package:

   pi install npm:@juanmackie/pi-deepseek-peak
   

   To install the current source checkout instead:

   pi install ./
   

2. Start or reload pi:

   /reload
   

   If pi was not running during installation, start a new pi session instead.

3. Configure DeepSeek using pi's normal login flow:

   /login
   

   Select DeepSeek, or start pi with the existing DEEPSEEK_API_KEY environment variable. The extension reuses that credential; it never asks for or stores a second key.

4. Look at pi's default footer. You should see a status like:

   DS ● OFF-PEAK · 02h 13m → PEAK
   

   Before the scheduled pricing cutover, PRE-CUTOVER and → LIVE appear. A ⚠ means the account-health check needs attention; the schedule remains usable.

For a one-session smoke test, use pi -e ./extensions/deepseek-peak/index.ts. See docs/operations.md for troubleshooting, updates, removal, security boundaries, and maintainer verification.

Install

The current published release is 0.1.1 on npm. Public packages with the pi-package keyword are indexed in the pi.dev catalog automatically:

pi install npm:@juanmackie/pi-deepseek-peak

To pin that release:

pi install npm:@juanmackie/pi-deepseek-peak@0.1.1

From this local checkout:

pi install ./

For a one-off direct test:

pi -e ./extensions/deepseek-peak/index.ts

The package is raw TypeScript; pi loads the extension through its normal TypeScript extension loader. The named status composes with pi's built-in footer rather than replacing the footer.

Package links:

• npm: https://www.npmjs.com/package/@juanmackie/pi-deepseek-peak
• GitHub: https://github.com/juanmackie/pi-deepseek-peak
• pi.dev: https://pi.dev/packages/%40juanmackie/pi-deepseek-peak

Credentials and API health

The extension reuses pi's provider credentials. Configure DeepSeek once with pi's normal /login flow, or use the same DEEPSEEK_API_KEY environment variable that pi's built-in DeepSeek provider uses. The extension does not provide a second key-entry mechanism.

At startup and at most once every five minutes, it calls:

GET https://api.deepseek.com/user/balance
Authorization: Bearer <the resolved pi DeepSeek key>

The destination, headers, and key come from the same resolved pi provider-auth record. A configured HTTPS provider base URL is used as-is; credentials are never sent to a different origin, and redirects are rejected. The response is checked for the documented is_available and balance_infos shape, but balance amounts are never displayed, logged, persisted, or sent to the model. A successful balance response proves account/auth reachability, not inference latency or model availability.

Set PI_OFFLINE=1 (or true/yes) to skip the extension-owned API request. Offline mode keeps the schedule visible and does not add a warning.

Status bar output

After the pricing cutover, examples are:

DS ● OFF-PEAK · 02h 13m → PEAK
DS ● PEAK · 00h 42m → OFF-PEAK

Before the cutover, the status shows the would-be schedule phase with an explicit marker and counts down to the live schedule:

DS ● OFF-PEAK · PRE-CUTOVER · 16h 03m → LIVE

The pre-cutover phase is a schedule projection only. DeepSeek's currently published flat prices remain the billing rule until 2026-08-16 16:00 UTC; the marker prevents this projection from being mistaken for an active surcharge.

A compact ⚠ is appended when account health is degraded, including:

• no configured DeepSeek key;
• invalid provider destination or conflicting auth configuration;
• invalid key or another HTTP failure;
• network, timeout, or malformed response;
• an authenticated response with is_available: false (insufficient balance).

The phase and countdown remain available in every warning state. The extension does not show repeated notifications.

Schedule

The schedule is calculated locally in UTC because DeepSeek does not document an endpoint that reports the current pricing phase:

• PEAK: 01:00–04:00 UTC and 06:00–10:00 UTC;
• OFF-PEAK: all other times;
• peak prices are 2× the off-peak prices;
• the schedule becomes effective at 2026-08-16 16:00 UTC.

The phase windows and cutover are intentionally baked into the package and must be updated if DeepSeek changes its pricing page. The extension trusts the host clock, so a badly configured system clock can produce a wrong phase.

Development and verification

npm install
npm run typecheck
npm test
npm run pack:check

The tests cover exact cutover/window boundaries, day rollover, countdown formatting, auth and response handling, unsafe destinations, timeouts, offline mode, lifecycle cleanup, stale requests, and secret non-disclosure.

The package was validated with TypeScript, the Vitest suite, npm pack inspection, direct pi -e loading, and a local pi install ./ smoke check. The published npm release is 0.1.1; pi.dev indexes public npm packages automatically. The authenticated health request itself requires a user-provided DeepSeek credential and is intentionally not run as part of automated tests.

Sources and attribution

• DeepSeek Models & Pricing
• DeepSeek Get User Balance
• DeepSeek API authentication
• DeepSeek error codes
• YMRYMR/deepseek-peak, reviewed at commit 44873104d8afe5a81814205ad6701684c396f709

The schedule math is adapted from that MIT-licensed project. See THIRD_PARTY_NOTICES.md and LICENSE.