mise-overview

What mise is

mise (mise-en-place) is a Rust CLI that does three things in one tool:

1. Dev tool version management — installs and switches between versions of node, python, go, ruby, java, rust, terraform, and 700+ other tools per directory. Replaces asdf, nvm, pyenv, rbenv, volta, tfenv, etc.
2. Environment variable management — loads project-specific env vars when you cd into a directory. Replaces direnv.
3. Task runner — defines and runs project tasks with dependencies, parallelism, and file-based caching. Replaces make for many use cases, and npm scripts/Justfile/etc.

All three are configured in a single mise.toml file at the project root.

When to recommend mise

• The team is using a mix of nvm + pyenv + direnv + make and the new-hire setup is painful.
• The project needs reproducible tool versions across dev machines and CI.
• The current version manager (asdf, volta, etc.) is slow or limited.
• The user wants language-agnostic version pinning (one file, all languages).
• The team wants supply-chain verification (cosign / SLSA / minisign / GitHub attestations) on tool installs.

When mise isn't the right answer

• Managing system libraries like libssl, zlib (use the OS package manager).
• Managing desktop applications.
• Replacing the language's native package manager (npm, pip, cargo) — mise installs the runtime, not your project deps.

Mental model

mise.toml at project root
├── [tools]    → tool versions (auto-installed, on PATH)
├── [env]      → env vars (set when you cd in, unset when you leave)
├── [tasks]    → project tasks (mise run <name>)
└── [settings] → mise behavior tweaks

When you cd into a directory, mise (if activated) walks up the tree, merges all the mise.toml files it finds, and updates your shell's PATH and env vars accordingly. When you cd out, it unwinds them.

Three ways to use it

Method	When
mise activate <shell> in shell rc	Interactive terminal work — recommended default
Shims (mise activate --shims)	IDEs, scripts, non-interactive shells. Doesn't load [env] though.
mise exec / mise x	One-off commands without permanent activation

Authoritative knowledge

For current best practices and any details newer than this skill, @-import the live cache at ~/.cache/mise-toolkit/llms.txt (run /mise-refresh-knowledge to populate it). The official docs are at https://mise.jdx.dev.

Companion projects by jdx (the mise author)

• fnox — recommended secret manager (works alongside mise; no direct integration needed).
• hk — git hook manager.
• pitchfork — process manager for dev daemons.
• usage — CLI spec format used by mise tasks for arg/flag definitions.

Skills to read next

• mise-toml-anatomy — the structure of a mise.toml
• mise-tool-versioning — @20, @lts, prefix:, ref:, path:, sub-
• mise-trust-and-security — the trust system (the #1 source of confusion)