danielmiessler
Setup didn't download patterns or strategies
Using fabric from Termux (Android), I did download binary and put in PATH, then:
- start Ollama (local):
ollama serve - download model:
ollama pull smollm2:135m - setup:
fabric --setup, steps: 2 14 15 17 19 - list patterns:
fabric -l(no output)
Workaround
- git clone (fabric)
- copy patterns and strategies folders to:
.config/fabric - list patterns works as expected
Termux has packages related to AI:
- ollama
- llama-cpp
- aichat
- oterm (uv tool install oterm)
Is the ~/.config/fabric/.env file being updated correctly when you do the fabric -S step?
Seems that .env is been updated:
$ cat $HOME/.config/fabric/.env
DEFAULT_VENDOR=Ollama
DEFAULT_MODEL=llama3.2:latest
PATTERNS_LOADER_GIT_REPO_URL=https://github.com/
danielmiessler/fabric.git
PATTERNS_LOADER_GIT_REPO_PATTERNS_FOLDER=pattern
s
PROMPT_STRATEGIES_GIT_REPO_URL=https://github.co
m/danielmiessler/fabric.git
PROMPT_STRATEGIES_GIT_REPO_STRATEGIES_FOLDER=str
ategies
OLLAMA_API_URL=http://127.0.0.1:11434
LANGUAGE_OUTPUT=en
But, both URLs are:
https://github.com/danielmiessler/fabric.git
It's ok like that? I just put ENTER (leave empty) in steps 15 & 19 to have defaults.
But, both URLs are:
https://github.com/danielmiessler/fabric.git
It's ok like that?
Yes, that is okay.
This feels like a bug, but I can't reproduce it on my Linux, Windows, or MacOS boxes.
What do you see when you run these commands?
uname -a
fabric --version
This feels like a bug, but I can't reproduce it on my Linux, Windows, or MacOS boxes.
What do you see when you run these commands?
uname -a fabric --version
$ uname -a
Linux localhost 4.19.113-27223811 #1 SMP PREEMPT Fri Dec 27 13:00:08 KST 2024 aarch64 Android
~
$ fabric --version
v1.4.164
I am having this same issue. I have removed the .env and done a new setup. I have tried to reinstall fabric, but it won't download the patterns or strategies. When I do the patterns via setup, I get a "loaded" file only and it says configured, when I do strategies, it only creates the folder, doesn't download anything and never updates the .env for the path or the setup to say configured.
I am on a brand new Mac
❯ fabric --version v1.4.168
I manually typed ~/.config/fabric/strategies when it asked for the path, because I thought strategies would mean ./strategies. So that might have caused me to run into the same issue? Would be better if it displays the full path in the setup prompt imho.
for me deleting the strategies & patterns folder as well as the related line in the .env, then running setup and re-downloading patterns addressed the issue
Had similar issues - unsure who this will help, if anyone. Fresh install (go) and fabric -l came up empty. Ran setup fabric --setup again to see a required option for 24 (Patterns) & 25 (Strategies). Ran both of those using their defaults since the .env file was pointing to the default location which matched the repo. I now have both patterns and strategies. Moral of my story, I was excited to use the product and failed to complete the setup.
Yes. We should do a better job of telling the user what to do in these situations.
Let me see what I can add. For example, "fabric -l" could notice there are no patterns and suggest that the user complete the setup.
@mrn3ff I recently re-organized the entire repo, so now the pattern and strategies are in ./data/patterns and ./data/strategies
Tried all of the suggestions and can't seem to get past this (without the manual workaround of cloning/copying). After the download process the only thing in the patterns dir is an empty file named 'loaded'. The strategies folder is empty:
[20ms][~]$ fabric --version
v1.4.210
[15ms][~]$ fabric -U
Downloading patterns and Populating /home/redacted/.config/fabric/patterns...
/5.5s
[5.445s][~]$ ls ~/.config/fabric/patterns
loaded /0.1s
[19ms][~]$ cat ~/.config/fabric/patterns/loaded /0.1s
[13ms][~]$ fabric -l
No Patterns
[22ms][~]$ uname -a
Linux redacted 6.12.34-1-MANJARO #1 SMP PREEMPT_DYNAMIC Thu, 19 Jun 2025 15:49:06 +0000 x86_64 GNU/Linux
@rrrodzilla What does your ~/.config/fabric/.env look like? Paste it here and redact your API keys and we can probably figure it out together.
Hi ! I've just installed fabric via the recommended script and I'm facing the same issue where fabric -l yields No Patterns.
Here the content of ~/.config/fabric/.env:
DEFAULT_VENDOR=OpenAI
DEFAULT_MODEL=gpt-5.2
PATTERNS_LOADER_GIT_REPO_URL=https://github.com/danielmiessler/fabric.git
PATTERNS_LOADER_GIT_REPO_PATTERNS_FOLDER=data/patterns
PROMPT_STRATEGIES_GIT_REPO_URL=https://github.com/danielmiessler/fabric.git
PROMPT_STRATEGIES_GIT_REPO_STRATEGIES_FOLDER=data/strategies
OPENAI_API_KEY=<REDACTED>
OPENAI_API_BASE_URL=https://api.openai.com/v1
@Marchelune Which version of Fabric?
Did you run the "patterns" and "strategies" setup?
fabric -S
Available plugins (please configure all required plugins)::
AI Vendors [at least one, required]
[1] Abacus
[2] AIML
[...]
Tools
[24] Custom Patterns - Set directory for your custom patterns (optional) (configured)
[25] Default AI Vendor and Model [required] (configured)
[26] Jina AI Service - to grab a webpage as clean, LLM-friendly text (configured)
[27] Language - Default AI Vendor Output Language (configured)
==> [28] Patterns - Downloads patterns [required] (configured)
==> [29] Strategies - Downloads Prompting Strategies (like chain of thought) [required] (configured)
[30] YouTube - to grab video transcripts (via yt-dlp) and comments/metadata (via YouTube API) (configured)
[Plugin Number] Enter the number of the plugin to setup (leave empty to skip):
Once you do this, it should be fine. Periodically, you'll want to do fabric -U to update the patterns.
This is a common setup issue referenced in #1863 - I plan to address this User Experience issue soon.