cli-anything

A method for building a command-line interface around a graphical application or source-code repository. It adapts the CLI-Anything approach for OpenClaw while keeping the generated Python interface format.

In plain words
What is it for?
Use it to build or improve a Python command-line harness from a local software folder or GitHub repository, including one-shot commands, interactive sessions, JSON output, and supported undo or redo.
Why use it?
It gives OpenClaw a repeatable way to turn software that normally requires a graphical interface into commands an agent can run and test.

Skill for Claude CodeCodex

Install

Getting it into your agent

One page per mod, every tool's command on it. A separate URL per tool would split the same page into five that compete with each other.

agentmods
npx agentmods add skills/hkuds/cli-anything/macrocli
Any agent
npx skills add HKUDS/CLI-Anything --skill macrocli
Clone the repo
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/HKUDS/CLI-Anything

Made for: Claude Code, Codex.

Per session 54 Skills are progressive disclosure: only the name and description are preloaded; the body loads when the skill is used.
When invoked 770 The whole file, excluding the scripts and references it only reads on demand.
Security scan A 0 findings. Scan, not verified.
Origin original No closer match found in the catalogue.
Token cost

What it costs to keep this loaded

Counted locally with the o200k_base tokenizer, which is exact for GPT models; Claude uses its own tokenizer and its counts differ. Treat this as one consistent yardstick across the catalogue rather than a bill. Prices are per million input tokens.

ModelPer sessionOnce invoked
Fable 5 $0.00054 $0.00770
Opus 5 $0.00027 $0.00385
Sonnet 5 $0.00011 $0.00154
Haiku 4.5 $0.00005 $0.00077

Measured yesterday against content hash 4bde6f418454, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-08-30, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade A, and why

cli-anything scanned grade A with 0 findings against 26 rules in 11 categories — prompt injection, anti-refusal, data exfiltration, privilege escalation, supply chain, agent snooping, system-prompt leakage, SSRF and excessive agency — measured yesterday.

The scan reads SKILL.md. This mod also ships 27 executable files (agent-harness/cli_anything/macrocli/__init__.py, agent-harness/cli_anything/macrocli/__main__.py, agent-harness/cli_anything/macrocli/backends/__init__.py, …), listed below but not scanned — reading those needs a real analyzer, not pattern matching.

A static scan of the body, not an audit. Every finding is printed with the line that produced it so you can judge whether it matters here. A mod is markdown that instructs an agent; that is exactly why what it instructs is worth reading.

Nothing flagged

None of the 26 patterns this scan looks for appear in this file: no shell pipes, no recursive deletes, no credential paths, no hidden text, no instruction-override or anti-refusal phrasing, no agent-config snooping. That is not a guarantee, it is the absence of the things that are checkable.

macrocli/SKILL.md · 111 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 111 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

CLI-Anything for OpenClaw

Use this skill when the user wants OpenClaw to act like the CLI-Anything builder.

If this skill is being used from inside the CLI-Anything repository, read ../cli-anything-plugin/HARNESS.md before implementation. That file is the full methodology source of truth. If it is not available, follow the condensed rules below.

Inputs

Accept either:

  • A local source path such as ./gimp or /path/to/software
  • A GitHub repository URL

Derive the software name from the local directory name after cloning if needed.

Modes

Build

Use when the user wants a new harness.

Produce this structure:

<software>/
└── agent-harness/
    ├── <SOFTWARE>.md
    ├── setup.py
    └── cli_anything/
        └── <software>/
            ├── README.md
            ├── __init__.py
            ├── __main__.py
            ├── <software>_cli.py
            ├── core/
            ├── utils/
            └── tests/

Implement a stateful Click CLI with:

  • one-shot subcommands
  • REPL mode as the default when no subcommand is given
  • --json machine-readable output
  • session state with undo/redo where the target software supports it

Refine

Use when the harness already exists.

First inventory current commands and tests, then do gap analysis against the target software. Prefer:

  • high-impact missing features
  • easy wrappers around existing backend APIs or CLIs
  • additions that compose well with existing commands

Do not remove existing commands unless the user explicitly asks for a breaking change.

Test

Plan tests before writing them. Keep both:

  • test_core.py for unit coverage
  • test_full_e2e.py for workflow and backend validation

When possible, test the installed command via subprocess using cli-anything-<software> rather than only module imports.

Validate

Check that the harness:

  • uses the cli_anything.<software> namespace package layout
  • has an installable setup.py entry point
  • supports JSON output
  • has a REPL default path
  • documents usage and tests

Read the full file on GitHub · 111 lines

Files

What ships with it

39 files beside SKILL.md in the same directory: the scripts, references and assets a skill reads on demand. Not counted in the per-session cost; read them before you install if any of them is executable.

Changes

What this file has done since we first saw it

Hashed on every crawl. A supply-chain change to an agent config is a question of when, not whether, so the history is kept rather than the latest state alone.

  1. yesterday First seen · 111 lines · 54 tokens per session scan A 4bde6f418454

Subscribe to this mod's changes

cli-anything is a skill published in the GitHub repository HKUDS/CLI-Anything (48,669 stars, last pushed 11d ago), licensed Apache-2.0. It adds 54 tokens to every session and 770 once invoked, about $0.0003 per session on Opus 5. A static security scan graded it A with 0 findings. No closer match exists in the catalogue, so it is treated as the original; first seen 2026-08-30.

Related

Other skills, from other repositories

systematic-debugging

Use when encountering any bug, test failure, or unexpected behavior, before proposing fixes.

obra/superpowers · 21 tokens

next-cache-components-adoption

Turn on Cache Components in a Next.js app and resolve the blocking routes it surfaces. Use when the user wants to enable, adopt, or migrate to Cache Components, flip the cacheComponents flag, work through a flood of blocking-prerender / instant validation errors, run the cache-components-instant-false codemod, or…

vercel/next.js · 95 tokens

babysit-pr

Babysit a GitHub pull request after creation by continuously polling review comments, CI checks/workflow runs, and mergeability state until the PR is merged/closed or user help is required. Diagnose failures, retry likely flaky failures up to 3 times, auto-fix/push branch-related issues when appropriate, and keep…

openai/codex · 114 tokens

imagegen

Generate or edit raster images when the task benefits from AI-created bitmap visuals such as photos, illustrations, textures, sprites, mockups, or transparent-background cutouts. Use when Codex should create a brand-new image, transform an existing image, or derive visual variants from references, and the output…

openai/codex · 113 tokens

cpu-profile-analysis

Analyze V8/Chrome CPU profiles (.cpuprofile) and DevTools trace files (Trace-.json). Use when: profiling performance, investigating slow functions, comparing code paths, finding bottlenecks, analyzing timeToRequest, understanding call trees from sampling profiler data, analyzing layout/paint/rendering, investigating…

microsoft/vscode · 71 tokens

next-cache-components-optimizer

Drive a Next.js route to instant navigation by setting up an agentic loop, under Cache Components / PPR, on initial load (hard navigation) and client-side navigation (soft navigation). Encode the goal as a failing @next/playwright instant() e2e and work it to green, one verified route at a time; the shipped test then…

vercel/next.js · 170 tokens