Redpine CLI

redpine is the command-line client for Redpine Connect: search licensed research collections, preview results before paying for them, and call upstream MCP tools from a terminal or an agent.

Built for agents: JSON on a pipe, human-readable in a terminal, one envelope and one set of exit codes everywhere.

Install

brew install redpine-ai/tap/connect-cli

Binaries for Linux, macOS and Windows are on the releases page. redpine update upgrades a release-page install in place and verifies the download against the release checksums.

Authenticate

redpine auth login                 # browser-based OAuth
redpine auth set-key sk_live_...   # or store an API key
export REDPINE_API_KEY=sk_test_... # or use the environment (sandbox keys work too)
redpine whoami

A sandbox key (sk_test_) returns synthetic fixtures at no cost; whoami says so.

Search

# search a collection (billed per result)
redpine search corpus "how does authentication work"
redpine search corpus "rate limiting" --limit 5

# preview for free, then pay only for what you want
redpine preview corpus "crispr delivery"
redpine confirm qry_a1b2c3d4e5f6                 # unlock every previewed result
redpine confirm qry_a1b2c3d4e5f6 abc123 def456   # unlock only these

# filter — repeatable; key=value, key!=value to exclude, key>=N for ranges
redpine search corpus "crispr" --filter issn=1234-5679
redpine search corpus "crispr" --filter issn=1234-5679,2345-6787   # any-of
redpine search corpus "crispr" --filter 'issn!=2345-6787'          # exclude
redpine search corpus "crispr" --filter doi=10.1345/aph.1g425      # case-insensitive
redpine search corpus "crispr" --filter 'journal_metric.2yr_mean_citedness>=5'

# full DSL for OR / nesting
redpine search corpus "crispr" \
  --filter-json '{"or":[{"field":"issn","eq":"1234-5679"},{"field":"issn","eq":"2345-6787"}]}'

# what can I search, and what do I have left?
redpine collections
redpine balance

preview takes the same --limit, --filter and --filter-json as search. Filters are documented at docs.redpine.ai/docs/filtering.

MCP tools

redpine tools list
redpine tools info analytics--run_query
redpine tools call analytics--run_query query="SELECT * FROM events" limit=10

# pass JSON input (useful for agents)
echo '{"query": "test"}' | redpine tools call analytics--run_query
redpine tools call analytics--run_query --input '{"query": "test"}'

# pipe chaining auto-wires ids between calls
redpine tools call media--create_workspace --input '{"filter":{"query":"X"}}' \
  | redpine tools call media--daily_briefing

Output

A terminal gets human-readable output. A pipe or a script gets the JSON envelope.

redpine search corpus "query" | jq '.data'   # JSON, automatically
redpine search corpus "query" --json         # force JSON in a terminal
redpine collections --pretty | less          # force human-readable in a pipe

{"status": "ok", "data": { ... }}
{"status": "error", "error": {"code": "...", "message": "...", "hint": "...", "suggestions": [...]}}

Exit codes: 0 success, 1 error, 2 auth, 3 bad input, 4 server error.

Other commands

redpine docs               # open docs.redpine.ai
redpine docs filtering     # open a page; short names like auth, sdk, preview work too
redpine completion zsh     # shell completion (Homebrew installs it for you)
redpine update             # upgrade a release-page install; Homebrew users: brew upgrade connect-cli

Environment variables

Variable	Description
REDPINE_API_KEY	API key; skips redpine auth login. CONNECT_API_KEY is still read as a fallback
REDPINE_BASE_URL	Server URL override. CONNECT_SERVER_URL is still read as a fallback
NO_COLOR	Disable coloured output
CLICOLOR_FORCE	Force coloured output

The same two names configure the SDKs, so one shell setup serves both.

License

Apache-2.0