assay init writes a config so later verbs need no repeated flags.

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Which file

--config-file → $ASSAY_CONFIG → ./assay.config.json → ~/.config/assay/config.json → none. Each value: flag > env > config > built-in default.

​
Shape after init

{
  "db": "~/.local/state/assay/assay.sqlite",
  "keyFile": "~/.config/assay/transcript.key",
  "principal": "user:you",
  "mode": "corpus",
  "capture": {
    "claudeCodeRoot": "~/.claude/projects",
    "grokRoot": "~/.grok/sessions",
    "codexRoot": "~/.codex/sessions",
    "opencodeRoot": "~/.local/share/opencode"
  }
}
~ is expanded.

​
Mode

Value
corpusYour own work with AI. Labelling is in scope.
observabilitySomeone else’s agent loop. Labelling optional.

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Products

Optional. See Products. 
{
  "products": {
    "workspaceRoots": ["~/code"],
    "groups": {
      "website": ["marketing-site", "docs-site"]
    }
  }
}
A component in two groups is a load error.

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Labelling

Used when you run assay labelling on. Name a harness CLI, or an API: 
{
  "labelling": {
    "api": {
      "url": "https://api.example.com/v1/chat/completions",
      "model": "your-model",
      "keyEnv": "YOUR_API_KEY"
    }
  }
}
keyEnv is the name of an environment variable. Never the secret. Optional search.kinds if you want tool traffic in the index. Default is messages and reasoning only. See Search.

​
Forward compatibility

Unknown top-level section: warning, ignored. Unknown key inside a section this build owns: fail loud. --strict-config / $ASSAY_STRICT_CONFIG=1: unknown top-level section is an error. Use in CI. When you add a section a newer Assay understands, upgrade the binary. assay --version is the check. A section the installed build ignores is silence of a different kind.

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Postgres

$ASSAY_PG_DSN or --pg. Do not also pass --db. A config db key is the SQLite path. It is not a second name for Postgres.