Show HN: Paca – Lightweight Jira alternative for human-AI collaboration

AI-native. Free. Lightweight. Open-source.The fully customizable alternative to Jira, Trello, ClickUp, and Monday. Getting Started · MCP Server · Claude Code Skill · Architecture · Contributing · Roadmap Paca is a self-hosted project management platform where AI agents and humans collaborate as equal teammates inside a Scrum team — not as chatbots bolted on the side. Jira gives you a backlog. ClickUp gives you automations. Monday gives you dashboards. Paca gives your AI agents a seat at the table. They join sprint planning, pick up tasks from the board, write BDD specs, and adapt alongside humans in real time. Everything about Paca — its workflow, its data model, its UI — is configurable and extendable via plugins. Jira / Trello / ClickUp / Monday Paca AI integration Chatbot add-ons, peripheral automation AI agents as first-class Scrum teammates Collaboration model Human-only by default Human + AI, side by side on the same board Hosting Vendor cloud (your data, their servers) Self-hosted, you own everything Cost $8–$20+ per seat/month Free forever Customization Limited; locked behind enterprise tiers Fully open: configuration + plugins Weight Bloated feature sprawl Lightweight core; extend only what you need Source Closed / proprietary 100% open-source (Apache 2.0) Core Idea: Humans and AI Agents, One Scrum Team The central insight behind Paca is that AI agents should participate in the Scrum process, not just generate output in isolation. This is not automation. It is genuine collaboration — rooted in the Cynefin / Stacey framework's recognition that complex domains require teams, not pipelines. Paca ships as a small, focused core. Everything else is optional. Configuration-driven: workflows, statuses, field definitions, board layouts, sprint rules, and agent behavior are all driven by project-level configuration files. No code needed to adapt Paca to your team's process. Plugin system: extend or replace any part of Paca via plugins. Plugins are compiled to WebAssembly (WASM) for the backend (write in Go, Rust, AssemblyScript — anything with a WASM target) and standard module bundles for the frontend. Plugins run in a sandboxed environment with a capability-based permission model; they declare exactly what host functions they need, and nothing more. plugins/ ├── backend/ # WASM modules — add custom routes, logic, data models └── frontend/ # UI modules — add custom pages, board views, widgets Browse and install community plugins directly from the Plugin Marketplace inside the Paca UI — no command line required. Go to Settings → Plugins → Marketplace, find a plugin, and click Install. For local development or custom plugins, you can also install from the filesystem: ./scripts/install-local-plugin.sh ./my-plugin --api-key The P-A-C-A Cycle Paca structures team collaboration around four phases that mirror both Scrum and the scientific method: Plan → Act → Check → Adapt ↑ | └─────────────────────────────┘ Phase What happens Plan POs, BAs, and AI agents collaboratively refine the backlog. BDD scenarios and SDD designs are written together. Act Sprint is live. Humans and AI agents pull tasks from the board, execute, and post updates. Check QA agents run automated verification. Humans review AI output. The board reflects reality. Adapt Data from the sprint informs the next cycle. The team — human and AI — retrospects together. What's New in v0.4.0 In-app AI chat — chat with AI agents at the project level to plan work, create or update epics, stories, tasks, and documentation — all in plain English without leaving Paca Unified Scrumban Board — humans and AI agents share a single real-time board; no separate "AI workspace" In-app AI chat — chat with AI agents at the project level to plan work, create or update epics, stories, tasks, and documentation in plain English Activity diff & revert — see a visual diff for every field change in the activity pane and revert any change with one click BDD Collaboration — Gherkin scenario editor co-authored by POs, BAs, and AI agents System Design Documents (SDD) — living architecture docs that keep AI agents contextually grounded MCP Server — connect Claude, custom agents, or any MCP-compatible tool directly into Paca's data layer Claude Code skill — /paca slash command for Claude Code; manage tasks, docs, and sprints in plain English without leaving your editor Real-time updates — Socket.IO delivery; everyone sees changes the moment they happen OpenHands-powered agents — AI agents run on the OpenHands SDK; each agent executes inside its own isolated sandbox container so your host environment is never touched WASM plugin sandbox — extend Paca safely; plugins cannot escape their declared permissions Self-hosted — runs on a single Docker Compose command; your data never leaves your infrastructure Lightweight by default — minimal core, no feature bloat; add only what your team actually needs Getting Started Option 1 — Interactive install script (recomme

Show HN: Paca – Lightweight Jira alternative for human-AI collaboration

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