clanker

LLM-powered shell helper that generates a command and pastes it into your terminal input so you can edit or run it.

Install

Use uv:

uv tool install clanker

Quick start

Configure the endpoint, model, and API key once:

clanker config

Then ask for a command:

clanker do "List all the files with the extension .pyc in this directory recursively and sum up their sizes"

Ask a question (no command insertion):

clanker ask "What does the -print0 flag do in find?"

By default, clanker will attempt to paste the generated command into your active terminal input (no auto-enter). If pasting fails, the command is printed so you can copy it manually.

You can also omit the do subcommand; clanker "..." is treated as clanker do "...". Prompts should be provided as a single quoted string.

Verbose mode (prints request payload, response, and step logs to stderr). Use -v or --verbose, and it can appear anywhere in the command:

clanker -v do "List all .py files"

Fish integration (recommended)

Many Linux distros disable tty injection. If you use fish, the best UX is to install the fish wrapper so the command is inserted via commandline -i:

clanker init fish

If you want the script printed instead of written, run clanker init fish --print.

Restart fish (or run the source ... command that clanker init prints) and then run clanker "..." as usual.

Configuration

Interactive wizard:

clanker config

Show config:

clanker config show

Set values directly:

clanker config set --endpoint https://api.openai.com/v1 --model gpt-4o-mini --api-key sk-...

Config file location:

clanker config path

Environment overrides:

• CLANKER_ENDPOINT
• CLANKER_MODEL
• CLANKER_API_KEY
• CLANKER_SHELL
• CLANKER_CONFIG (full path to config file)

Notes on pasting

Clanker uses a Linux tty injection (TIOCSTI) to paste the command into the current terminal input buffer. Some systems disable this for security (for example dev.tty.legacy_tiocsti=0). If it is blocked, clanker prints the command instead. You can also force printing with:

clanker --print "..."