pi-chrome-dev-tools

Lazy-launch browser control for pi agents. Uses your system Chrome with a persistent profile — logins, cookies, and extensions carry across sessions. Stealth-patched to avoid bot detection out of the box.

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Why chrome-dev-tools?

	chrome-dev-tools	pi-browser-harness	Playwright MCP
Zero setup — no remote debugging, no flags	✅	❌ manual Chrome config	❌
Instant startup — browser launches on first tool call	✅	❌ connects at pi start	❌
Persistent login — cookies survive across sessions	✅	✅	❌
Bot detection avoidance — stealth patches built in	✅	❌	❌
System Chrome — no Chromium download	✅	✅	❌ 150MB+ download
AX tree + click coordinates	✅	✅	partial
Pi-native — no MCP overhead	✅	✅	❌

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Quick Start

pi install npm:pi-chrome-dev-tools

That's it. No Chrome flags, no remote debugging setup. The first chrome_navigate call launches Chrome automatically.

Requirements

• pi (latest)
• Node.js ≥ 22
• Google Chrome installed

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Tools

Page Inspection

Tool	Purpose
chrome_snapshot	DEFAULT — accessibility tree with @(x,y) click coordinates
chrome_execute_js	Evaluate JS in page context — surgical DOM reads
chrome_page_info	URL, title, viewport size, scroll position
chrome_screenshot	Capture PNG (visual verification only)

Navigation

Tool	Purpose
chrome_navigate	Navigate to a URL (launches Chrome on first call)
chrome_go_back / chrome_go_forward	History navigation
chrome_reload	Reload current page
chrome_wait / chrome_wait_for_load	Wait N seconds or for page load

Interaction

Tool	Purpose
chrome_click	Click at viewport coordinates from chrome_snapshot
chrome_type	Type text into focused element
chrome_press_key	Press a key (Enter, Tab, Escape, arrows, etc.)
chrome_scroll	Scroll the page

Tabs

Tool	Purpose
chrome_list_tabs	List open tabs with URLs
chrome_switch_tab	Switch to tab by index
chrome_new_tab	Open a new tab
chrome_close_tab	Close a tab

Lifecycle

Tool	Purpose
chrome_close	Close browser (relaunches on next tool call)

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Patterns

Page inspection (default workflow)

chrome_snapshot()           → AX tree with @(x,y) per interactive element
chrome_execute_js(expr)     → surgical reads for specific values
chrome_screenshot()         → ONLY for visual verification

Form filling

chrome_snapshot()                        # find the input @(x,y)
chrome_click({ x, y })                   # focus it
chrome_type({ text: "hello" })           # type
chrome_press_key({ key: "Tab" })         # next field

Data extraction

chrome_execute_js({ expression: "document.querySelector('.price').innerText" })

Multi-tab research

chrome_new_tab({ url: "https://..." })
chrome_list_tabs()
chrome_switch_tab({ index: 0 })

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How it works

• Playwright drives a dedicated Chrome instance via CDP
• Persistent profile at ~/.chrome-dev-tools/profile preserves logins
• System Chrome via channel: "chrome" — no Chromium download
• Stealth via @mr_ozio/playwright-stealth — patches navigator.webdriver, plugin arrays, permissions API, and more
• Lazy launch — Chrome only starts when a tool is first called
• Auto-cleanup — browser closes when the pi session ends

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License

MIT