CLI & REPL API Reference

The CLI lives under chimera.cli. Every subcommand is wired up by chimera.cli.main.build_parser() and dispatched by main(); the interactive REPL itself lives in chimera.cli.code.

For a narrative tour with examples, see modules/cli. This page is the canonical export list.

chimera.cli.main

Symbol	Purpose
build_parser()	Builds the top-level argparse.ArgumentParser with all subcommands attached.
main(argv=None)	CLI entry point. Returns the process exit code.
run_synthesize(args)	Implements chimera synthesize (alias synth).
run_eval(args)	Implements chimera eval.
run_bench(args)	Implements chimera bench.
run_review(args)	Implements chimera review.
run_ci_fix(args)	Implements chimera ci-fix.
run_research(args)	Implements chimera research.
run_docs(args)	Implements chimera docs.
run_testgen(args)	Implements chimera testgen.
run_migrate(args)	Implements chimera migrate.
run_plugins(args)	Implements chimera plugins.
run_auth(args)	Implements chimera auth.

chimera code — the interactive REPL

chimera.cli.code runs the REPL, owning the readline-idle vs. raw-stdin running mode switch, the threaded agent loop, and the slash-command dispatcher.

Top-level flags

Flag	Description
--model <name>	Single model (overrides ANTHROPIC_MODEL).
--models <list>	Comma-separated list to cycle through with /model next / /model prev.
--mode interactive|rpc|json	Terminal mode. interactive is the default readline REPL; rpc speaks JSON-RPC 2.0 over stdio; json emits newline-delimited JSON objects.
--workdir <path>	Working directory for tool execution.
--max-steps <n>	Cap on ReAct iterations per turn.

Slash commands

Command	Action
/help	List slash commands and their arguments.
/model [next|prev|<name>]	Show or switch the active model. With --models, next/prev cycle through the list.
/cost	Print the running token + USD cost for the session.
/clear	Clear the screen.
/history	Dump the conversation history.
/tools	List the tools available to the agent.
/context	Show context-window usage and the active compaction strategy.
/debug	Toggle debug-event printing.
/session	Show session id, save path, and resume hint.
/compact	Force one compaction pass on the conversation.
/audit	Print the permission audit log for the current session.
/checkpoint [<name>]	Save (or restore-by-name with --restore <name>) a checkpoint.
/agent <preset>	Switch the active CodingAgent preset (coding_agent, codex, kimi, swebench, minimal, explore).
/init	Generate a CLAUDE.md for the current repo (uses the init skill).
/yolo	Switch into --permission-mode yolo for the rest of the session.
/tree	Print the full session-tree managed by SessionTree.
/branch <name>	Fork the current session into a new named branch.
/switch <name>	Switch to an existing branch in the session tree.
/exit	Exit the REPL.

Mid-turn steering via Ctrl-C interrupts the active step, drains the streamer, and surfaces a prompt for the next user message; sessions are auto-saved to ~/.chimera/sessions/ after every turn.

See also

• Configure Permissions for the --permission-mode flag exposed by the wider CLI matrix.
• chimera.sessions for SessionTree semantics.
• chimera.providers for model-name routing.