askoai

Prompt OpenAI — or any OpenAI-compatible API — straight from your terminal, the way you'd chat on the web. Text only, one question per call, answer printed and copied to your clipboard.

$ askoai What is the capital of France?
Paris.
(copied to clipboard)

Install

npm install -g askoai

Requires Node.js ≥ 22.12. askoai is installed.

Quick start

askoai profile new          # asks API_KEY, SYSTEM_PROMPT, BASE_URL, then "more? (y/N)"
askoai Explain monads in one sentence

The first profile you create becomes the default. Every later call uses the default profile unless you pass -p <name>.

Prompting

askoai What is the capital of France?
askoai 'Return {"city": "...", "country": "..."} for Paris'   # JSON answers are pretty-printed
git diff | askoai write a commit message                      # stdin is appended to the prompt
askoai -p work --no-copy "Summarise this"                     # pick a profile, skip the clipboard
askoai -m gpt-4.1 -s "Answer like a pirate" ahoy              # per-call model / system prompt
askoai --stream tell me a story                               # stream tokens (no JSON formatting)
askoai --raw 'give me json'                                   # never pretty-print
askoai ask profile of Ada Lovelace                            # explicit form, see Notes

| Flag | Meaning | |------|---------| | -p, --profile <name> | Use this profile instead of the default | | -m, --model <model> | Override the model for this call | | -s, --system <prompt> | Override the system prompt for this call | | -t, --temperature <n> | Override the temperature (0–2) | | --copy / --no-copy | Force clipboard copy on/off | | --stream / --no-stream | Stream the answer / wait for it | | --raw | Print exactly what the model returned |

When the answer is a JSON object or array (optionally inside a ```json fence) it is re-indented and colourised; the clipboard gets the plain, indented JSON.

Profiles

A profile bundles an API key, system prompt, base URL and a handful of model settings.

askoai profile                      # show the default profile
askoai profile ls                   # list profiles (* marks the default)
askoai profile new [name]           # create interactively (aliases: mk, create, add)
askoai profile show <name>
askoai profile default <name>       # set the default
askoai profile set --default <name> # same thing
askoai profile configure <name>     # edit every field interactively (aliases: config, edit)
askoai profile configure --system-prompt 'You are terse.'   # edit the default profile via flags
askoai profile configure work --model gpt-4.1 --temperature 0.2 --no-copy
askoai profile rm <name>            # aliases: remove, delete
askoai profile path                 # where the config lives

profile can be shortened to p (askoai p ls).

Fields

| Field | Flag | Notes | |-------|------|-------| | API_KEY | --api-key | Empty → uses $OPENAI_API_KEY at run time | | SYSTEM_PROMPT | --system-prompt | Optional | | BASE_URL | --base-url | Empty → https://api.openai.com/v1 (or $OPENAI_BASE_URL). Point it at Ollama, OpenRouter, Azure, … | | MODEL | --model | Default gpt-4o-mini | | TEMPERATURE | --temperature | 0–2 | | MAX_TOKENS | --max-tokens | Integer | | TOP_P | --top-p | 0–1 | | COPY_TO_CLIPBOARD | --copy / --no-copy | Default yes | | STREAM | --stream / --no-stream | Default no |

The last six are the "more? (y/N)" questions in profile new. Any flag you pass to profile new skips that question; profile new <name> -y --api-key … creates a profile with no questions at all (handy for scripts). Passing an empty string (--system-prompt '') clears a field.

Where it's stored

~/.config/askoai/config.json (respects $XDG_CONFIG_HOME; %APPDATA%\askoai on Windows), written with mode 0600. Set ASKOAI_CONFIG_DIR to use another directory.

Notes

• An unquoted prompt that starts with a command name (profile, p, ask) is treated as that command. Quote it (askoai 'profile of Ada Lovelace') or use the explicit form: askoai ask profile of Ada Lovelace.
• Clipboard copy uses clipboardy; on Linux it wants xsel/xclip/wl-copy but ships a fallback. If copying fails you'll see a dim notice on stderr and the answer is still printed.
• Only OpenAI's Chat Completions endpoint is used, so any server that implements it works via BASE_URL.

Development

npm install
npm run dev -- What is 2+2          # run from source
npm run check                       # typecheck + lint + tests
npm run build                       # emit dist/

node scripts/mock-server.mjs        # OpenAI-compatible echo server on :8765 for manual testing
ASKOAI_CONFIG_DIR=/tmp/askoai askoai profile new dev -y --api-key x --base-url http://127.0.0.1:8765/v1

License

MIT