Overview
cli-developer is an open-source frontend skill for Claude Code and compatible agents, published by Jeffallan. Its author describes it as: “Use when building CLI tools, implementing argument parsing, or adding interactive prompts. Invoke for parsing flags and subcommands, displaying progress bars and spinners, generating bash/zsh/fish completion scripts,…”. The project has 11k stars on GitHub and is available under the MIT license. Add it to your setup with `/plugin marketplace add Jeffallan/claude-skills`.
What cli-developer does
1. **Analyze UX** — Identify user workflows, command hierarchy, common tasks. Validate by listing all commands and their expected `--help` output before writing code. 2. **Design commands** — Plan subcommands, flags, arguments, configuration. Confirm flag naming is consistent and no existing signatures are broken. 3. **Implement** — Build with the appropriate CLI framework for the language (see Reference Guide below). After wiring up commands, run ` --help` to verify help text renders correctly and ` --version` to confirm version output. 4. **Polish** — Add completions, help text, error messag…
What’s inside
The SKILL.md for cli-developer is organised into these sections:
- Core Workflow
- Reference Guide
- Quick-Start Example
- Node.js (commander)
- Constraints
- MUST DO
- MUST NOT DO
- Output Templates
- Knowledge Reference
Installation
Add cli-developer to your agent with:
/plugin marketplace add Jeffallan/claude-skillsReview a skill’s source before installing it — skills can instruct your agent to run commands. This command comes from the skill’s public repository, which is the source of truth for setup steps. New to skills? Read how to install Claude Code skills.
Supported agents
- Claude Code — ships a claude code plugin marketplace
License
cli-developer is published under the MIT license.
Strengths
- Clear MIT license — safe to read and adapt within its terms
- Ships in Jeffallan/claude-skills, an established project with 11,060 GitHub stars
- Works with Claude Code
- Actively maintained — repository updated in the last 90 days
Author
Topics
Frequently asked questions
- What does cli-developer do?
- Use when building CLI tools, implementing argument parsing, or adding interactive prompts. Invoke for parsing flags and subcommands, displaying progress bars and spinners, generating bash/zsh/fish completion scripts, CLI design, shell completions, and cross-platform terminal applications using commander, click, typer, or cobra.
- How do I install cli-developer?
- Run /plugin marketplace add Jeffallan/claude-skills in your agent, then reload your skills. Review the source at https://github.com/Jeffallan/claude-skills before installing.
- Is cli-developer free to use?
- Yes. cli-developer is free and open source under the MIT license, so you can read, run, and adapt it within that license's terms.
- Which agents does cli-developer work with?
- cli-developer lists Claude Code — named in its SKILL.md, its plugin marketplace or its repository topics. Skills use the portable SKILL.md format, so other agents that read that format may load it too.
- Where does cli-developer come from?
- cli-developer ships inside Jeffallan/claude-skills, a repository that contains 41 catalogued skills in total. The repository's 11,060 GitHub stars apply to that whole collection, not to this skill on its own.