wiki-client

A command-line tool to fetch Wikipedia articles and display them in the terminal.

Overview

wiki is a Python CLI that retrieves Wikipedia articles via the Wikipedia REST API and renders them with Rich for a beautiful terminal experience.

Features

• Fetch articles — Query Wikipedia by article title or search query
• Search mode — Show a ranked list of search results
• Featured articles — Fetch Wikipedia's daily featured article
• Random articles — Fetch random Wikipedia articles
• Most-read articles — Fetch Wikipedia's most-read articles for yesterday
• Daily news — Fetch Wikipedia's "In the news" stories
• Raw output — Print plain text instead of Rich-formatted output
• AI Agent Skills — Ready-to-use skill files for OpenCode, Copilot, Claude, Codex, Windsurf, Aider, and Cursor

Requirements

• Python 3.10 or newer

The following Python packages are installed automatically:

Installation

Recommended: uvx (no permanent install required)

The easiest way to run wiki is with uvx from the uv toolkit. This downloads and runs the tool in an isolated environment without permanently installing it:

uvx --from wiki-client wiki "Unix shell"

Install uv (if you haven't already):

curl -LsSf https://astral.sh/uv/install.sh | sh

pip install (permanent install)

Installing via pip places the wiki command on your $PATH directly:

pip install wiki-client
wiki "Unix shell"

Install from source

git clone https://github.com/dsillman2000/wiki-client.git
cd wiki-client
pip install .
wiki "Unix shell"

Or use the provided install script:

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/dsillman2000/wiki-client/main/install.sh | bash

Install AI Agent Skills

The wiki CLI includes skill files for various AI agents. Install them directly from GitHub without cloning the repository:

Remote Installation (Recommended)

Use the unified installer script with the -a flag to specify the agent:

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/dsillman2000/wiki-client/main/install/skill.sh | bash -s -- -a opencode

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/dsillman2000/wiki-client/main/install/skill.sh | bash -s -- -a copilot

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/dsillman2000/wiki-client/main/install/skill.sh | bash -s -- -a claude

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/dsillman2000/wiki-client/main/install/skill.sh | bash -s -- -a codex

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/dsillman2000/wiki-client/main/install/skill.sh | bash -s -- -a windsurf

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/dsillman2000/wiki-client/main/install/skill.sh | bash -s -- -a aider

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/dsillman2000/wiki-client/main/install/skill.sh | bash -s -- -a cursor

Install for Windsurf (Codeium)

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/dsillman2000/wiki-client/main/install/skill.sh | sh -s -- -a windsurf

Install for Aider

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/dsillman2000/wiki-client/main/install/skill.sh | sh -s -- -a aider

Install for Cursor

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/dsillman2000/wiki-client/main/install/skill.sh | sh -s -- -a cursor

#### Local Installation

If you have cloned the repository, you can install locally:

```bash
# Install for OpenCode
./install/skill.sh -a opencode

# Install for GitHub Copilot
./install/skill.sh -a copilot

# Install for Claude
./install/skill.sh -a claude

# Install for Codex
./install/skill.sh -a codex

# Install for Windsurf (Codeium)
./install/skill.sh -a windsurf

# Install for Aider
./install/skill.sh -a aider

# Install for Cursor
./install/skill.sh -a cursor

Show help:

./install/skill.sh -h

Docker

A Docker image is available on GitHub Container Registry (GHCR) with all dependencies pre-installed:

# Pull the image
docker pull ghcr.io/dsillman2000/wiki-client:latest

# Run a query
docker run --rm ghcr.io/dsillman2000/wiki-client:latest "Unix shell"

# Extract specific section
docker run --rm ghcr.io/dsillman2000/wiki-client:latest -s History "Bash"

# List sections
docker run --rm ghcr.io/dsillman2000/wiki-client:latest --ls "Python"

# Save output to file (mount current directory)
docker run --rm -v "$(pwd)":/home/wiki ghcr.io/dsillman2000/wiki-client:latest \
  "Operating system" -o os.md

Advantages:

• No local dependency installation required
• Consistent environment across systems
• Easy integration into CI/CD pipelines
• Lightweight multi-stage build (~218MB)

Usage

Basic Queries

# Fetch an article
wiki "Unix shell"

# Print plain text (no Rich formatting)
wiki "Unix shell" --raw

Search Mode

# Show search results instead of auto-fetching
wiki --search "shell programming"

Section Listing & Filtering

# List all sections in an article
wiki --list-sections "Unix shell"
wiki --ls "Unix shell"          # shorthand

# Extract a specific section (fuzzy match)
wiki -s History "Unix shell"
wiki -s "early" "Unix shell"    # matches "Early shells", "Early history", etc.

# Multiple sections
wiki -s History -s "See also" "Unix shell"

Featured & Random Articles

# Fetch today's featured Wikipedia article
wiki --featured

# Extract specific section from featured article
wiki --featured -s "Early life"

# Fetch featured article for specific date
wiki --featured --featured-date 2025-03-23
wiki --featured-date 2025-03-23  # --featured-date implies --featured

# Extract section from specific date's featured article
wiki --featured-date 2025-03-23 -s "Storyline"

# List sections of featured article
wiki --featured --ls

# Fetch a random Wikipedia article
wiki --random

# Save random article to file
wiki --random -o random_article.md

Most-Read & News

# Fetch yesterday's most-read Wikipedia articles
wiki --most-read

# Extract specific article from most-read list
wiki --most-read -s "Eiffel Tower"

# Fetch most-read articles for specific date
wiki --most-read --most-read-date 2026-03-23
wiki --most-read-date 2026-03-23  # --most-read-date implies --most-read

# List most-read articles (compact view)
wiki --most-read --ls

# Save most-read to file
wiki --most-read -o most_read.md

# Fetch today's "In the news" stories
wiki --news
wiki --news --raw
wiki --news -o news.md
wiki --news --ls

Version

wiki --version

Examples

# Get the Unix shell article
wiki "Unix shell"

# Search for shell-related articles
wiki --search "shell interpreters"

# Print raw text
wiki "Bash (Unix shell)" --raw

# List all sections
wiki --ls "Unix shell"

# Read the History section
wiki -s History "Unix shell"

Development

Quick Start

# Install in editable mode with dev dependencies
pip install -e .
pip install pytest pytest-httpx ruff

# Or use Make
make install-dev

Linting & Testing

make lint       # ruff + shellcheck + prettier
make lint-python  # ruff only
make test       # pytest

Or run directly:

ruff check wiki_client/ tests/
python -m pytest tests/ -v

Available Make Targets

make help           # Show all targets
make install        # pip install -e .
make install-dev    # Install dev dependencies
make lint           # Run all linting checks
make lint-python    # ruff
make lint-shell     # shellcheck
make lint-markdown  # prettier
make test           # pytest
make format         # prettier --write README.md
make clean          # Remove build artifacts

How It Works

1. Query resolution — Tries a direct Wikipedia REST API title lookup; falls back to a full-text search if the title returns 404.
2. Rendering — Uses Rich to render the article extract as formatted Markdown in the terminal. Pass --raw for plain-text output.

Version

1.0.0

License

MIT