Formicaio version 0.7.9 has been released and it’s ready for installation across all supported platforms in native mode. Docker containers built with this new version, including for UmbrelOS and CasaOS, will be also published in the next few hours.
What’s new in v0.7.9:
AI Agent (new page in the sidebar)
Chat directly with your node fleet: ask it to start, stop, or inspect nodes, get health summaries, or query which node has the most stored records
Responses stream in real time, just like a chat app
Every tool call the agent makes is shown in an expandable panel, so you always know exactly what action was taken
Multiple chat sessions, each with its own history
AI Autonomous Mode
Toggle a background agent that wakes up on a schedule, checks the health of every node, and automatically restarts any that are offline
A built-in events log keeps a timestamped history of every check cycle and what (if anything) was done
Alert notifications in the top bar bell let you know when the agent acted
Configurable check interval, and a per-cycle action cap so the agent stays conservative until you’re comfortable with it
AI Agent Settings
LLM Base URL, model name, and optional API key
Custom system prompt to fine-tune the agent’s behavior
Max context messages, autonomous check interval, and max actions per cycle, all adjustable
Running a local LLM with Formicaio:
The agent connects to any OpenAI-compatible backend running on your machine or local network — your data never leaves your device. The easiest way to get started is Ollama: install it, pull a model, and point Formicaio at http://localhost:11434. Models with tool-calling support work best; qwen3:8b is the recommended default for reliable multi-step actions, though lighter options like llama3.2:3b are available for resource-constrained machines. Keep in mind that larger models produce more reliable results but consume noticeably more RAM and CPU — especially relevant if your machine is already busy running several nodes.
Full setup instructions, model recommendations, and configuration details are in the README
Known issue: Tool call results displayed in the chat may occasionally appear raw or incorrectly formatted, for example, numeric values shown without units or structured data not fully rendered. This does not affect the agent’s ability to act on your nodes; it is a display-only issue.
Make sure that, after upgrading, you refresh the page of any instance of the Formicaio frontend/GUI you have open on a browser with Ctrl + F5.
This update keeps restarting my nodes or something because I don’t have the AI installed.
I also don’t use the earnings tracking with formicaio. It forces me to put a URL, so I just put a local IP. Even though it accepts it as an input, i get a bunch of connections errors.
I’ll be double checking, but unless you’ve enabled the autonomous mode and have some LLM it can connect to, there is nothing running which could automatically restart your nodes, or try to act on them, it must be something else causing the issue you see.
Thanks for the feedback. I’ll try to add a toggle so it can be disabled from the settings.
Formicaio version 0.7.10 has been released and it’s ready for installation across all supported platforms in native mode. Docker containers built with this new version, including for UmbrelOS and CasaOS, will be also published in the next few hours.
This version incorporates the following improvements and fixes:
Fix: Tool call results and agent responses in the chat are now properly decoded and formatted resolving display issues
Feature: Rewards monitoring and earnings analytics can now be enabled or disabled from the Settings panel
Internal refactoring: MCP tool definitions are no longer duplicated, descriptions and parameter schemas are now derived directly from the existing MCP tool structs
Improvement: AI agent prompts refined, clearer rules, tighter autonomous mode instructions, and better guidance on tool usage for more reliable behaviour across different models
Here are the results from my intermittent testing - this time running formicaio-v0.7.7 for a bit over four weeks. No payments were received. I started with 10 nodes and kept adding two more every few hours until I maxed out the load:
formicaio-v0.7.7
Total Nodes | 24 - 24 Active - 0 Inactive
Current Total Balance | 242.6718 242.671846948645930994
Address | 0x70A7eF68...
Balance | 242.6718
Estimated Network Size | 242
Stored Records | 393301 - 0 Relevant
Total Connected Peers | 791 - Shunned by 0
Nodes Disk Usage | 1137.03 GB
Disk Status | 15.71%
Used | 6280.24 GB free of 7451.03 GB
Glances:
Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Quad CPU Q9505 @ 2.83GHz 2.83/2.83GHz CPU 96.7% idle 1.9% ctx_sw 11K MEM 57.7% active 2.92G SWAP - 9.1% LOAD - 4core
CPU [||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||| 96.7%] user 78.2% irq 0.0% inter 12K total 7.64G inacti 3.21G total 7.64G 1 min 14.01
MEM [||||||||||||||||||||||||||| 57.7%] system 15.6% nice 0.0% sw_int 8K used 4.41G buffer 284K used 713M 5 min 12.80
LOAD [||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||| >100%] iowait 1.4% steal 0.0% guest 0.0% free 3.23G cached 3.17G free 6.95G 15 min 13.07
Once it has been released I’ll be making a more accurate assessment, but I will need to adapt Formicaio to make it compatible with new binary, it should be possible, I’ll just need to figure out if metrics will be available and/or what changes were introduced w.r.t. For the docker mode, it would need a musl build so if that is available, Formicaio should also work for docker deployment mode.
I figured it would take some jiggering only after the release. I just love Formicaio so much, especially on Umbrel, that I’m anxious to see it deployed.
Thanks so much for your efforts. I think they’ll really pay off for you and the rest of us.
Formicaio version 0.8.0 has been released and it’s ready for installation across all supported platforms in native mode only.
Docker containers built with this new version, including for UmbrelOS and CasaOS, are not yet supported.
This version supports only new version of ant-node for Autonomi v2, incorporates the following changes:
Autonomi v2 ant-node compatibility — updated to support the new ant-node binary from Autonomi v2.
ARMv7 build targets have been dropped as they are no longer supported by ant-node v0.10.0.
Configurable log level — when adding nodes, the Advanced tab now has an “Enable logging” toggle and a log level selector (error / warn / info / debug / trace).
Source component prefixes in log entries — internal log messages now include a prefix identifying the source component, making log output easier to read and filter.
Consolidated database migrations — all incremental migration files have been replaced with a single consolidated init migration, simplifying fresh installs and reducing migration overhead.
Known Issues:
Metrics unavailable — ant-node v0.10.0 doesn’t expose the metrics service and/or data on the metrics port, despite the --metrics-port flag still being accepted. As a result, per-node stats (records, connected peers, memory/CPU usage, etc.) is not be populated. This will be restored once ant-node metrics support is re-added.
How does one enable logs in the node binary. We’ve tried with the ant command and Chriso says that logs are there as optional but cannot see how to turn on logs
--enable-logging
Enable logging output. When omitted, the tracing subscriber is not installed and no log records are emitted, even if the binary was built with the `logging` feature. The remaining `--log-*` options are ignored unless this flag is set
[env: ANT_ENABLE_LOGGING=]
--log-level <LOG_LEVEL>
Log level
Possible values:
- error: Error messages only
- warn: Warnings and errors
- info: Informational messages (default)
- debug: Debug messages
- trace: Trace messages (verbose)
[env: RUST_LOG=]
[default: info]
Formicaio version 0.8.1 has been released and it’s ready for installation across all supported platforms in native mode only.
Docker containers built with this new version, including for UmbrelOS and CasaOS, are not yet supported.
This version supports only new version of ant-node for Autonomi v2, and is a maintenance update that includes the following changes and improvements:
Replaced charting library: Switched from apexcharts-rs to charming for more actively maintained and reliable chart rendering.
Metrics chart: an empty-state message is shown when no metrics are available yet.
Dashboard navigation: Clicking the total nodes card now navigates directly to the nodes list.
Dependencies: Updated to latest versions.
Known Issues:
Metrics unavailable — ant-node v0.10.x doesn’t expose the metrics service and/or data on the metrics port, despite the --metrics-port flag still being accepted. As a result, per-node stats (records, connected peers, memory/CPU usage, etc.) is not be populated. This will be restored once ant-node metrics support is re-added.
I’ll be trying to build Umbrel/docker containers with different base since none of the ant-node v2 releases are built with musl, currently the Formicaio containers are built with Alpine-based. I’ll post an update if I manage to get a successful new release to solve this.
Formicaio version 0.8.2 has been released and it’s ready for installation across all supported platforms in native mode. Docker containers built with this new version, including for UmbrelOS, were also published.
This release solves the issue that was preventing from building Docker images to run Formicaio both with native nodes and with Dockerised nodes
Known Issues:
Metrics unavailable — ant-node v0.10.x doesn’t expose the metrics service and/or data on the metrics port, despite the --metrics-port flag still being accepted. As a result, per-node stats (records, connected peers, memory/CPU usage, etc.) is not be populated. This will be restored once ant-node metrics support is re-added.
OK, my next intermittent test - installation was painless again - 2 nodes to get started - the amount of disk space that the nodes are using is slowly going up but is that the only indication that something is working"?
