Installation

Prerequisites

Billy needs Ollama to talk to AI models.

• Billy Slim — install Ollama separately
• Billy Full — Ollama is bundled, auto-starts on first run

Alpha Software

Billy is in alpha. Expect rough edges and breaking changes between versions.

Quick Install

Slim (macOS/Linux)

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jd4rider/billy-app/main/scripts/install.sh | bash

Then install Ollama separately at ollama.com.

Full (bundled Ollama)

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jd4rider/billy-app/main/scripts/install.sh | bash -s -- --full

Ollama is included and starts automatically.

Homebrew

brew tap jd4rider/billy
brew install billy

Windows (Scoop)

scoop bucket add billy https://github.com/jd4rider/scoop-billy
scoop install billy

Build from source

git clone https://github.com/jd4rider/billy-app.git
cd billy-app
go build -o billy ./cmd/billy
./billy

Requires Go 1.24+.

Verify installation

billy --version

Pull your first model

ollama pull mistral    # great all-rounder, ~4GB
# or
ollama pull llama3.2  # fast 3B model, ~2GB

Then run billy and start chatting.