Scira CLI

Terminal-native AI research and coding agent. Ask a question, get a grounded report with cited sources and verified claims — all stored locally and inspectable.

Documentation: docs site (local: cd docs && bun run dev) · MDX sources in docs/content/docs/

Install

npm install -g @scira/cli

Requires Node.js ≥ 20. Run the interactive setup:

scira init

This walks you through API keys and configuration with signup links and step-by-step instructions.

Check your setup:

scira doctor    # verify keys are detected
scira keys      # show where to get any missing keys

Quickstart

# Interactive TUI (home screen with session history)
scira

# Headless run — writes a report to .scira/runs/<id>/report.md
scira "compare browser automation tools in 2025"

# Interactive TUI for a specific question
scira new "history of the Silk Road" --tui

# Classic readline shell for a specific question
scira new "history of the Silk Road" --shell

API keys

Scira needs credentials for an LLM provider (model calls) and a search provider (web search). Run scira init for a guided setup, or copy .env.example and fill in keys manually.

Where keys are loaded from (highest priority first):

1. Shell environment (already exported in your terminal)
2. <project>/.scira/.env when you run Scira from that project
3. ~/.scira/.env for global defaults

# Option A: interactive wizard (saves to ~/.scira/.env)
scira init

# Option B: manual — global keys
mkdir -p ~/.scira && cp .env.example ~/.scira/.env

# Option B: manual — project keys only
mkdir -p .scira && cp .env.example .scira/.env

scira doctor   # confirm keys are detected
scira keys     # signup links + steps for anything still missing

LLM providers (set one in config via scira init or /llm)

| Key | Provider | Where to get it | |---|---|---| | AI_GATEWAY_API_KEY | Vercel AI Gateway (default) | vercel.com/docs/ai-gateway → dashboard → AI Gateway → API Keys | | XAI_API_KEY | xAI (Grok) | console.x.ai → API Keys | | CLOUDFLARE_ACCOUNT_ID + CLOUDFLARE_API_TOKEN | Cloudflare Workers AI | dash.cloudflare.com (account ID) + API Tokens with Workers AI permission | | HF_API_KEY | Hugging Face Inference | huggingface.co/settings/tokens |

Search providers (set one via scira init or /provider)

| Key | Provider | Where to get it | |---|---|---| | EXA_API_KEY | Exa (default) | dashboard.exa.ai/api-keys | | FIRECRAWL_API_KEY | Firecrawl | firecrawl.dev/app/api-keys | | PARALLEL_API_KEY | Parallel | platform.parallel.ai |

FIRECRAWL_API_KEY is also used as an automatic fallback when Exa or Parallel search fails, so it is worth setting even if Firecrawl is not your primary search provider.

Commands

| Command | Description | |---|---| | scira init | Interactive setup for API keys and configuration | | scira keys | Show where to get and save missing API keys | | scira [question] | Open TUI home, or run headlessly if a question is given | | scira new <question> | Start a run; add --tui or --shell to open interactive UI | | scira resume <run-id> | Resume a run; add --tui or --shell to specify UI | | scira list | List all runs | | scira show <run-id> | Print run status (sources, claims, report state) | | scira run <run-id> | Re-run the research agent on an existing run | | scira verify <run-id> | Print the claim verification report | | scira export <run-id> | Export report (md, json, or csv) with --format and --output | | scira mcp list | List configured MCP servers | | scira mcp add <transport> <name> <target> | Add an MCP server (stdio, sse, or http) | | scira mcp oauth <name> | Run OAuth PKCE flow for an MCP server | | scira mcp enable <name> | Enable an MCP server | | scira mcp disable <name> | Disable an MCP server | | scira mcp remove <name> | Remove an MCP server from config | | scira watch <goal> | Monitor a topic on a schedule with diffing | | scira models [--provider <p>] | List available AI Gateway models | | scira config | Print the resolved config | | scira doctor | Check credentials and environment |

Configuration

Config merges ~/.scira/config.json (global) with .scira/config.json (project). All fields are optional.

{
  "model": "deepseek/deepseek-v4-flash",
  "approvalMode": "suggest",
  "runDirectory": ".scira/runs",
  "maxSources": 20,
  "citationPolicy": "strict",
  "search": {
    "provider": "exa",
    "maxResults": 8,
    "includeDomains": [],
    "excludeDomains": []
  }
}

| Field | Default | Description | |---|---|---| | model | deepseek/deepseek-v4-flash | AI Gateway model ID | | approvalMode | suggest | manual, suggest, or auto tool approval | | runDirectory | .scira/runs | Local directory where run data is stored | | maxSources | 20 | Max sources the agent may gather per run | | citationPolicy | strict | strict (all claims cited) or balanced | | search.provider | exa | exa, firecrawl, or parallel | | search.maxResults | 8 | Max results per search query |

Environment variables

See API keys for signup links. Required keys depend on your llmProvider and search.provider in config.

| Variable | Required when | Purpose | |---|---|---| | AI_GATEWAY_API_KEY | llmProvider: gateway | Vercel AI Gateway model calls | | XAI_API_KEY | llmProvider: xai or xSearch | Grok model calls; also enables the xSearch tool for real-time X/Twitter posts | | CLOUDFLARE_ACCOUNT_ID, CLOUDFLARE_API_TOKEN | llmProvider: workers-ai | Workers AI model calls | | HF_API_KEY | llmProvider: huggingface | Hugging Face Inference | | EXA_API_KEY | search.provider: exa | Web search via Exa | | FIRECRAWL_API_KEY | search.provider: firecrawl | Web search + scrape via Firecrawl | | PARALLEL_API_KEY | search.provider: parallel | Web search via Parallel |

Run Directory

Each run writes to .scira/runs/<run-id>/:

goal.txt          original question
plan.md           agent's research plan
notes.md          incremental findings
sources.jsonl     sources gathered (id, url, title, snapshot path)
claims.jsonl      claims extracted and verified
report.md         final report
convo.json        full conversation + feed (for TUI resume)

License

MIT