The command line

The command line runs the same engine as the app, with no screen: for scripts, CI, servers, and for checking a project before you cook it. A collection cooked from either is byte-for-byte the same. Every command and option is listed in the command reference; this section is organized by task.

Task	Page
Look inside any nfty file, find problems, see the odds	Check a project
Create and change CookBooks, Recipes and Ingredients from files	Build a project from a script
Generate a Set, grow it, write models	Cook, extend and model
Rise pictures, set depth, snap soft edges, work with sheet grids	Models, depth and sheets
Export, upload and seal	Publishing
Write a Menu and roll from it	Menus and tickets

For a guided first run, see Your first collection from the command line.

Running it

You have	Run
A Windows download	cli\Nfty.Cli.exe <command>
A Linux download	./cli/Nfty.Cli <command>
A source checkout	dotnet run --project src/Nfty.Cli -- <command>

This manual writes nfty for any of these; see the alias tip in Install nfty.

nfty --help                 # every command
nfty generate --help        # one command's options
nfty --version

Conventions every command follows

Ids, not names. Options such as --recipe, --variant and --id take the part's id ([stone]), not its display name (Stone). nfty inspect prints both side by side.

Options that do not apply are refused, not ignored. --variant on a .rcp, --royalty without collection.json, --sheet-cols without --sheet: each is an error naming the problem, so a typo never silently does nothing.

Colors carry a prefix. hex:d6249f, rgb:214,36,159, hsl:322,72,49, hsv:322,83,84. A missing or unknown prefix is an error, never a guess. See Color specs.

Secrets are named by source, never typed. There is no --passphrase. --key and --pinata-key take env:NAME, file:PATH, stdin or prompt. See Where a secret comes from.

Edits are checked and atomic. Every command that changes an archive validates the result first and replaces the file in one step, so a failure never leaves half a file.

Errors are sentences. A failed command prints one line meant to be read and exits with code 1. Add --verbose for the stack trace as well.

Thread count changes speed, never output. Every command takes --threads N (or max); the NFTY_THREADS environment variable sets it when the option is absent. The default is two thirds of the logical processors.

In a script or CI job

set -e
nfty validate book.cbk                       # exit 1 lists every problem
nfty generate book.cbk --count 1000 --seed "$RELEASE" --out out --pack
nfty inspect out                              # what the run produced
NFTY_KEY="$SECRET" nfty export out --out dist --preset sealedcritique --key env:NFTY_KEY

nfty ipfs status exits 1 when the upload service cannot be reached, so a pipeline can check before it uploads.