wa-agent

wa-agent

WhatsApp control for the DeepSeek Harness agent.

wa-agent adds a family of 46 wa_* tools that let an agent operate a WhatsApp account: connection and pairing, chats and message history, text, media, locations, contacts and polls, reactions, edits, deletes, groups, contact book, profile and privacy, presence, and the event stream.

The tools talk to a long-lived wa-agent bridge that ships inside this package. The bridge (bridge/bridge.mjs, built on Baileys) owns the WhatsApp socket, the auth state and the message store; it also exposes a loopback HTTP endpoint for the human-facing QR code. The plugin speaks to it over JSON-lines RPC on stdio or, when a service manages the bridge, over loopback HTTP.

Install

One command installs the plugin, the bridge and the bridge's npm dependencies:

npx @deepseek-ai/dsh plugin --profile web add github:songjongdevsecops/wa-agent

On pnpm 11 and newer, that command may stop once because pnpm blocks dependency build scripts by default (ERR_PNPM_IGNORED_BUILDS). It names the packages. Approve them in the profile's pnpm-workspace.yaml and re-run the same command:

allowBuilds:
  baileys: true      # preinstall only checks the Node.js version
  protobufjs: false  # postinstall belongs to the protobufjs CLI, not the runtime

Restart the harness to load the bundle (the bundle layer is read at boot, not at install time):

npx @deepseek-ai/dsh web

The package declares dsh.bundle.patch, so the add command appends wa-agent to dsh.profile.bundles in the profile manifest. That line is the only activation.

Check the loaded line:

npx @deepseek-ai/dsh --profile web --dump-config | grep -A3 wa-agent

Expected shape:

- id: wa-agent
  name: wa-agent
  config: {}

No extra step is needed to run the bridge: the plugin spawns it on the first tool call (autoStart, default true) and restarts it after a crash. The first thing left to do is pair your WhatsApp account (next section).

Update and uninstall

# update: re-run the add command, then restart the harness
npx @deepseek-ai/dsh plugin --profile web remove wa-agent   # uninstall, then restart

Requirements

• Node.js ^22.19.0 || >=24.0.0.
• pnpm on PATH (npm install -g pnpm); the harness manages profile plugins with it.
• DeepSeek Harness itself, e.g. npx @deepseek-ai/dsh web.
• A WhatsApp account you control, paired by you (see below).

Pairing

On first run the bridge has no session and shows a QR. With the default httpPort: 29141:

1. Open http://127.0.0.1:29141/qr.png.
2. In the phone, open WhatsApp > Linked devices > Link a device and scan the QR.
3. Call wa_status (or ask the agent) to confirm the phase and the paired account.

Alternative: ask the agent for wa_pair_sms_code with the full international phone number. The phone receives a 6-digit code, typed in WhatsApp > Linked devices > Link with phone number.

The session is stored by the bridge, never by this package. It is reused on every reconnect until wa_logout is called. Pairing is per account; you pair your own account.

Usage

Ask the agent in natural language:

• "What is the WhatsApp status?"
• "Show the last 20 messages from this chat."
• "Send this image to <recipient> with the caption <caption>."
• "Create a group named <name> and add <participants>."
• "Mark this chat as read."

Tool groups:

Sends are per recipient. The plugin adds no mass-messaging, scraping or follower-growth surface.

Bridge resolution

The plugin looks for the bridge in this order:

1. an explicit deployment: bridgeDir in the plugin config, or the WA_WORKSPACE environment variable. The directory may hold bridge.mjs directly, or a workspace that holds wa-agent/bridge.mjs.
2. the bridge bundled in this package: bridge/bridge.mjs.
3. a historical standalone deployment under ~/wa-agent (bridge.mjs or wa-agent/bridge.mjs).

Set bridgeDir (or WA_WORKSPACE) to keep using a bridge you already run. When it is set, it is authoritative: a missing file fails with WA_BRIDGE_MISSING instead of silently starting the bundled bridge against a different state directory. When it is not set, the bundled bridge is used, with its runtime root at your home directory, so state lives in ~/wa-agent/.

Configuration

Every path is configurable; the defaults derive from your home directory. A patch replaces the whole config of the line, so restate every key you want to keep.

Profile patch example (~/.dsh/profiles/web/cordis.patch.yml):

- id: wa-agent
  config:
    bridgeDir: '/absolute/path/to/wa-agent'
    httpPort: 29141

Use an absolute path in the config; ~ is not expanded by the harness. Leaving bridgeDir out uses the bundled bridge.

The plugin adopts a bridge that is already listening on httpPort (for example, one managed by a service) instead of spawning a duplicate. With autoStart: false, start the bridge yourself before calling a tool:

WA_WORKSPACE="$HOME" WA_HTTP_PORT=29141 \
  node "$HOME/.dsh/profiles/web/node_modules/wa-agent/bridge/bridge.mjs"

Troubleshooting

• pnpm not found on PATH — npm install -g pnpm, then re-run the add command.
• ERR_PNPM_IGNORED_BUILDS — pnpm ≥ 11 blocked the baileys preinstall and the protobufjs postinstall. Add the allowBuilds block shown in Install to the profile's pnpm-workspace.yaml and re-run the add command.
• WA_BRIDGE_MISSING — an explicit bridgeDir/WA_WORKSPACE does not contain bridge.mjs or wa-agent/bridge.mjs. The error lists the paths it tried. Unset it to use the bundled bridge.
• No QR — call wa_status. The bridge may still be connecting, or httpPort may be 0 (HTTP disabled).
• Pairing rejected on the phone — the announced WhatsApp Web version may be outdated. The bridge asks Baileys for the current version at every boot; if the link still fails, update the package and Baileys.
• Plugin installed but no tools appear — restart the harness; the bundle layer is read at boot.

Security and limits

• The WhatsApp session is a private key. The bridge stores it in its data directory (<root>/wa-agent/data, ~/wa-agent/data with the bundled bridge). Never commit it, paste it into a prompt, or copy it into a repository. This package ships the bridge code only: no session, no message store, no QR cache and no media.
• The HTTP endpoint is loopback-only. Do not expose httpPort to a network: anyone who reaches it can drive the account.
• Baileys is an unofficial WhatsApp Web client. Automation may violate WhatsApp's Terms of Service and can put the account at risk. Use it on your own account, at your own judgment.
• The bridge runs alongside the harness. It is a child process of the plugin, not a service: it stops when the harness stops, and the plugin restarts it after a crash. A missing bridge is reported clearly (WA_BRIDGE_MISSING or WA_BRIDGE_DOWN), never as a silent success.
• Offline phone. Sending and receiving for known chats works while the phone is offline. First-time contacts and groups may need the phone online to distribute keys; long offline periods can unlink the device.
• Windows. The plugin and the bridge are plain Node.js; they run natively wherever Node can reach WhatsApp. Paths and the child process use Node's cross-platform APIs.

License

MIT