# shelbi open

Focus a workspace's tmux pane, creating it (with the agent running) if it doesn't exist yet.

```text
shelbi open [OPTIONS] <NAME>
```

`shelbi open` focuses a [workspace](/docs/concepts/workspaces)'s tmux pane,
creating it (with the agent already running inside) if it doesn't exist yet.
It's the single entry point behind both the sidebar's click-to-focus and the
dispatch path: the "does this pane exist?" check lives here, so callers never
have to branch on it themselves.

For a **local** workspace, an empty pane is created by re-entering this same
command under `--as-pane`, the wrapper that owns the agent subprocess and
emits a `pane_alive=false` event when it exits. For a **remote** workspace, the
pane is a proxy window that `ssh -t … tmux attach`es into the workspace's own
remote tmux session, since the lifecycle wrapper isn't deployed to remote
machines.

`open` focuses (or creates) the pane inside the Shelbi tmux session. It's how
you jump to a workspace from the sidebar. To connect your own terminal directly
to a workspace's pane instead, use [`shelbi attach`](/docs/cli/attach).

## Arguments

| Argument | Type | Default | Description |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| `<NAME>` | string | — | Name of the workspace to open (required). |

## Flags

| Flag | Type | Default | Description |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| `--root <PATH>` | string | install-time default / `$SHELBI_ROOT` / `~/.shelbi` | Override the Shelbi root directory. The flag wins over both the env var and the compile-time default. |
| `-p, --project <PROJECT>` | string | env / cwd lookup | Project to operate on. |

## Examples

Focus (or create) the `alpha` workspace's pane:

```bash
shelbi open alpha
```

## See also

- [Workspaces](/docs/concepts/workspaces) — what a workspace is, its pane
  lifecycle, and the local vs. remote distinction.
- [`shelbi attach`](/docs/cli/attach) — connect your terminal directly to a
  workspace's pane instead of focusing it inside the Shelbi session.