Introduction

Welcome to Clif. Here you'll find all the resources you need to get started making your command line interface (CLI).

What does Clif do for me?

Clif gives you the components and tools to design, build, and publish a CLI that delivers the best developer experience possible for your users. It implements a framework of CLI best practices out-of-the-box for you, encapsulating years of experience with what works and doesn't work for users of command line interfaces. It will take care of things like:

• Parsing your CLI's options, arguments, and environment variables
• Assisting you with a visual logic builder for your commands
• Compiling and packaging your CLI executable for all major platforms
• Distributing your CLI executable to package managers and tarballs

What do I need to know before building with Clif?

While you won't need to know how to code (Clif is a no-code platform), it helps to be familiar with the following technical concepts when building your CLI:

• HTTP Protocol (request/response cycle, headers, GET, PUT, PATCH, etc.)
• REST APIs
• Basic forms of API authentication
• JSON (Javascript Object Notation)
• Handlebars expressions
• Variables
• Loops
• Conditionals ("if" statements)