Golem CLI

A provider-agnostic terminal AI coding assistant. Chat with any LLM, read and edit files, search codebases, and run commands — all from your terminal.

Features

• Multi-provider: Anthropic Claude, OpenAI GPT, Google Gemini, and local Ollama models
• Built-in tools: Read, write, edit files; glob and regex search; shell commands; git; memory; todo tracking; multi-edit; patching; renaming; directory trees; code outline; diffing; web search; fetch; and more
• Rich terminal UI: Markdown rendering with syntax-highlighted code blocks and streaming responses
• Session persistence: Save and load conversations across sessions
• Context management: Automatic truncation when conversations exceed the context window
• Project-aware: Reads GOLEM.md/CLAUDE.md/README.md into the system prompt and includes remembered context
• Approval gating: Dangerous shell commands and non-read-only git operations require user confirmation
• MCP support: Connect external tool servers via the Model Context Protocol

Prerequisites

• Node.js >= 20.0.0
• An API key for at least one provider, or a local Ollama instance

Installation

npm install -g golem-cli

This installs the golem command globally.

Quick Start

Set your API key:

export ANTHROPIC_API_KEY=sk-...
# or
export OPENAI_API_KEY=sk-...
# or
export GOOGLE_GENERATIVE_AI_API_KEY=...

Run Golem:

golem                                          # Default (Anthropic Claude)
golem --provider openai --model gpt-4o         # Use OpenAI
golem --provider ollama --model llama3.1       # Use local Ollama
golem --debug                                  # Enable debug logging

Slash Commands

| Command | Description | |---------|-------------| | /help | Show available commands | | /clear | Clear conversation history | | /save | Save current session | | /load [id] | Load a saved session | | /history | List saved sessions | | /model | Show current model | | /provider | Show current provider | | /exit, /quit | Exit Golem |

Input Modes

• Single-line (default): Type and press Enter to send
• Multi-line: Press Ctrl+J to toggle. Enter adds newlines, Ctrl+Enter sends

Configuration

Golem uses layered configuration (later overrides earlier):

1. Built-in defaults
2. Global config: ~/.config/golem/config.json
3. Project config: .golem/config.json
4. Environment variables: GOLEM_PROVIDER, GOLEM_MODEL, provider API keys
5. CLI flags: --provider, --model, --debug

Example config:

{
  "provider": "openai",
  "model": "gpt-4o",
  "maxTokens": 4096,
  "contextWindow": 128000,
  "temperature": 0.7,
  "providers": {
    "ollama": {
      "baseUrl": "http://localhost:11434/api"
    }
  }
}

Built-in Tools

| Tool | Description | |------|-------------| | readFile | Read file contents with optional line range | | writeFile | Create or overwrite files | | editFile | Find-and-replace text in files | | multiEdit | Apply multiple replacements in one pass | | patch | Apply unified diffs | | listFiles | Glob-based file discovery | | searchFiles | Regex search across files | | bash | Shell command execution (requires approval) | | git | Git operations with approval gating | | memory | Persist key/value context across sessions | | todoManager | Track multi-step work items | | directoryTree | Show directory structure | | codeOutline | Extract symbols from source files | | diffFiles | Compare files or raw content | | rename | Rename or move files and directories | | webSearch | Search the web via SearXNG | | fetchUrl | Make HTTP requests to URLs |

License

MIT

Links

• GitHub Repository