Cardinal CLI

The official command-line tool for the Cardinal Framework.

A powerful and zero-setup CLI for bootstrapping, managing, and generating files for your Cardinal-based command-line tools.

Key Features

• Quick Start: Scaffold a complete, runnable Cardinal project structure in seconds using cardinal new.

• Code Generation: Easily add new commands and file templates to an existing project with cardinal add.

• Initialization: Configure the full Cardinal structure within any existing Dart project using cardinal init.

• Zero Boilerplate: Focused on Developer Experience (DX) to let you concentrate on your command logic, not setup.

Installation

To start building your own CLI with the Cardinal Framework, activate the official CLI globally via the Dart package manager:

dart pub global activate cardinal_cli

(Note: Requires a Dart SDK version compatible with the framework requirements.)

Quick Usage and Commands

The Cardinal CLI offers three core commands to manage your project lifecycle.

1. Create a New Project (new)

This is the fastest way to start. The new command scaffolds the complete directory structure, sets up the pubspec.yaml, and generates a runnable example command.

# Usage: cardinal new <project_name>
cardinal new my_awesome_cli

# Navigate to your new project and run it
cd my_awesome_cli
dart run

2. Initialize an Existing Project (init)

If you have an existing Dart project and wish to incorporate Cardinal, use init to create the necessary core file structure and configurations.

# Run inside the root folder of your existing Dart project
cardinal init

3. Add New Commands (add)

Use add to automatically generate the boilerplate for a new command class. The CLI creates the file in lib/commands/ and registers it in the main command runner.

# Usage: cardinal add command <command_name>
cardinal add login

4. Full Command List

Your CLI supports the following primary commands:

Command	Description
new	Creates a complete, ready-to-run new project structure.
init	Initializes and configures the core Cardinal structure in an existing project.
add	Adds a new template to the current project.

Framework Dependency

This CLI tool is the companion to the core library. To learn about defining arguments, options, and the execution context, please refer to the main package documentation:

Cardinal Framework on pub.dev

Contributing and Support

Please refer to the main Cardinal Framework repository for details on how to report issues, contribute code, or view the overall architecture.