Wiki / REDnode

REDnode UI Tools

REDnode UI Tools is an optional app pack for REDnode, for anyone curious about the game’s own interface or wanting to build on it. Its one app, the UI Workbench, opens inside the game and does five jobs:

Tab or button	What it does
Inspect	Shows the game’s UI as a live tree: every layer, every HUD piece, every widget. Point at anything on the HUD or in a menu and it tells you what it is, where it came from and every property it has
Try	Changes a game widget live (its text, colour, opacity, size, place) to find what controls a look. Never kept
To source	Copies a piece of the game’s HUD into a project of your own, as ink markup, so you start from the game’s own look
Projects and Edit	Write a native HUD panel (its markup and its script) in an editor in the game, with mistakes shown as you type, and run it live
Export	Turns a project into a zip that installs as a mod of its own, ready to share

Native UI means UI the game draws itself, with its own widgets, fonts and colours, as opposed to REDnode’s overlay windows, which are web pages drawn on top. The game’s UI system is called ink. If the words are new, read Native UI: ink markup first; the Workbench writes that markup for you.

Screenshot comingThe UI Workbench in the game

The game's HUD with the UI Workbench open in interactive mode: the Inspect tab with the layer tree at the left, the details of a picked widget at the right, and the picked widget outlined on the HUD behind the window.

Why you’d want it

If you…	The Workbench gives you
Wonder how a piece of the HUD is built	Pick it and read its widgets, their classes, sizes, colours and the file it came from, with no tools outside the game
Want to change how the game’s UI looks, in an archive or a redscript mod	Try a value on the live widget first, to see which property does what before you edit any file
Want a HUD panel of your own that fits the game	Copy the game’s own panel with To source, or start from the template, and run it in the game as you edit
Can’t code yet	The template works as it is: change words and numbers, press Save and watch the panel change. The tutorial walks you through it
Want to share what you made	Export makes a zip any REDnode player installs like any other mod

Inspect only reads. Try’s changes are put back when you press Reset or switch the Workbench off, and a save never holds one. Your projects live in your Documents folder, away from the game folder.

Status

Released. REDnode UI Tools 0.1.0 came out on 2026-11-03 with REDnode 0.56.1, its first release, with the UI Workbench 0.4.1. Every part below passed its in-game test on game version 2.5:

Part	Status
Inspect: the tree, Pick, Pick inside, the details	Passed in game on 2026-11-02
Projects and Edit: New, Rename, Delete, the editor, Run, Stop, Save while it runs	Passed in game on 2026-11-02 and 2026-11-03
Try and To source	Passed in game on 2026-11-03
Export, and installing the export as a mod	Passed in game on 2026-11-03
Buttons and other controls inside a native panel	Not yet: input on ink comes with REDnode’s phase I3, then the Workbench’s phase UT4
Projects on a menu, and whole screens of your own	Planned (phases UT4 and UT5)

It is a preview, built in the open: expect changes.

Install

You need	Why
REDnode 0.56.0 or later	The Workbench is a REDnode package. The current release is 0.56.1
Codeware 1.16 or later	The game’s UI layers reach REDnode through it
Cyberpunk 2077 on PC, game version 2.5	As REDnode

Download REDnode-UI-Tools-0.1.0.zip from its Nexus Mods page, or from REDnode’s releases on GitHub, where it is attached beside REDnode’s own zip. Then, with the game closed:

Vortex: use Mod Manager Download on Nexus, then enable and deploy.
EDGEdeck: add the zip and deploy.
By hand: extract the zip into your Cyberpunk 2077 folder, the one with bin and archive in it. The app lands in red4ext\plugins\REDnode\apps\ui-workbench.

Install it after REDnode: it goes into REDnode’s apps folder. To remove it, remove it in your mod manager, or delete that ui-workbench folder. REDnode and your projects stay.

Switch it on

Start the game and load a save.
Press F10 for interactive mode and click the REDNODE tab at the lower left to open the launcher. Switch on the Mod Manager.
Find UI Workbench (type work in the search box) and switch it on. It starts switched off, like every new package.
To reach it in one click next time, press Pin to launcher in its details.

The Workbench opens over the game. Its Inspect tab works at once.

Screenshot comingThe UI Workbench in the Mod Manager

The Mod Manager with UI Workbench selected: its details on the right with the Running switch on, Pin to launcher, and the Permissions part with the red warning under managing REDnode and its Allowed switch.

The admin permission

Four of the Workbench’s jobs need REDnode’s admin permission, shown in the Mod Manager as managing REDnode, because they start and stop packages (your projects) and change the game’s own widgets.

Needs `admin`	Works without it
Try, To source, the Edit and Projects tabs, Export	Inspect: the tree, Pick, the details, Path, JSON, Read all

To allow it: in the Mod Manager, select UI Workbench, read the warning under Permissions, and switch Allowed on for managing REDnode. Then open the tab you wanted again. Without it, Edit and Projects say: “Edit and Projects need the admin permission: allow it for UI Workbench in the Mod Manager (Permissions), then open this tab again.”

The same permission lets the Admin Tools pack’s Task Manager end any package. Allow it only for tools you trust; you can switch it off any time, and Inspect keeps working.

The Workbench window

The Workbench covers the whole game view, but only its window takes the mouse: everywhere else the page is see-through and your clicks reach the game or the windows behind.

To	Do
Move it	Drag its title bar
Resize it	Drag the grip in its bottom-right corner. It stops at 760 x 420
Put it back where it started	Reset position and size in its title bar (in the ⋯ menu when there’s no room for its icon)
Switch tabs	Inspect, Edit, Projects at the top
Read a status line cut short	Point at it: its tooltip shows the whole text
Close it	Its ✕. Closing it puts back everything Try changed

It keeps its place and size across starts. Like every REDnode window it shows only in interactive mode (F10), unless you pin it to the HUD; native panels it runs stay on the HUD either way, since the game draws them.

Screenshot comingThe Workbench's three tabs

The UI Workbench window alone, cropped: its title bar with the reset and close icons, the Inspect, Edit and Projects tabs, the Refresh, Pick and Pick inside buttons, and the status line at the right.

Where things are kept

What	Where
The app	`red4ext\plugins\REDnode\apps\ui-workbench` in the game folder
Your projects	`Documents\REDnode\UI projects`, one folder each. REDnode watches this folder as a development folder, so your projects run without being copied into the game
Deleted projects	`Documents\REDnode\UI projects\.trash`, where you can take them back
Exports	`Documents\REDnode\UI exports`, one zip per project and version

Projects and exports are outside the game folder, so game updates, reinstalls and EDGEdeck’s deploys never touch them.

In this part

Page
Inspect	The tree, Pick, Pick inside, a widget’s details
Try	Change a game widget live, with a walkthrough
To source	Copy a HUD piece into a project, with a walkthrough
Projects and Edit	New, the editor, Run, Stop and Save while it runs
Export	Share a project as a mod
Tutorial: your first native HUD panel	From New to an installed mod, step by step
Native UI: ink markup	The markup the Workbench writes, for newcomers
Troubleshooting	When a tab says no, a pick finds nothing, or a project won’t run

The developer reference is REDnode’s UI Tools guide and its Native game UI page.

For mod makers

Everything the Workbench reads is in the rednode package, for your own packages. The reads need no permission; Try needs admin.

Call	Gives
`ink.layers()`	The game’s layers and the HUD’s pieces
`ink.read(from, { depth, max, props })`	A tree of widgets in one call; with `props: true`, each one’s layout and look too
`ink.inspect(id)`	One widget in full: path, parents, controllers, source file, every property, and an `api` reference to it
`ink.at(x, y)`	The drawn widgets under a point, smallest first
`ink.boxes()`	Every drawn widget’s box in one call
`ink.try(id, prop, value)`, `ink.reset()`	Change one property of a game widget, and put it back

import { ink } from 'rednode';

const { hits } = await ink.at(200, 900);   // in the HUD's units
const w = await ink.inspect(hits[0].id);
console.log(w.path, w.controllers, w.properties.opacity);