ht-ml.app CLI

The only ht-ml.app tool that remembers what you published, a local registry of every site, its once-only update_key, and full version history, plus one-command publish-with-assets.

ht-ml.app is deliberately accountless: you POST one HTML document, get a public URL, and a write key shown exactly once. That makes publishing frictionless and management impossible. This CLI is the missing memory layer. Every publish is captured to a local SQLite store, so you can list and audit everything you've shipped, update a site by id without ever touching its key, auto-upload referenced assets in one pass, roll back to any prior version, and export a passphrase-sealed vault of your keys for disaster recovery.

Authentication

ht-ml.app has no global API key. Creating and reading sites needs no credential at all. Each site mints a high-entropy update_key once at creation — the only write credential, with no recovery endpoint. This CLI captures that key into a local store at create time, so update, asset, and password commands resolve it automatically by site_id. Keep the store safe and back it up with keys export; losing an update_key with no backup orphans the site forever.

Quick Start

# health check; works with no setup or credentials
ht-ml-pp-cli doctor --dry-run

# publish a local HTML file; prints the public URL and stores the site + key
ht-ml-pp-cli publish ./deck.html

# publish and auto-upload every referenced image/video in one pass
ht-ml-pp-cli publish ./report.html --assets

# list every site you've published (the inventory ht-ml.app can't give you)
ht-ml-pp-cli list

# replace a site's HTML by id; the update_key is resolved for you
ht-ml-pp-cli update <site_id> ./deck.html

# back up your once-only write keys for disaster recovery
ht-ml-pp-cli keys export --out ht-ml-keys.vault

Unique Features

These capabilities aren't available in any other tool for this API.

Registry & recovery

• list — See every site you've ever published, with health flags for orphaned sites and broken assets.

  Reach for this to recall or audit what you've shipped; it's the only way to enumerate sites the accountless API won't list.

  ht-ml-pp-cli list --agent --select url,title,status
  

• keys export — Reveal a single write key, or export/import a passphrase-sealed vault of all your update_keys for disaster recovery and a second machine.

  Use after publishing or before switching machines; without a vault, a lost key orphans the site forever.

  ht-ml-pp-cli keys export --out ht-ml-keys.vault
  

Asset reconciliation

• assets sync — Parse a site's HTML, find every referenced-but-missing image or video, and upload them all in one pass.

  Pick this whenever a published page has broken images; it fixes all of them at once instead of one upload per file.

  ht-ml-pp-cli assets sync <site_id> --root ./public
  

• assets audit — Across all your sites, list the ones with publicly-visible broken or missing images.

  Run during a review to catch broken client-facing pages before someone else does.

  ht-ml-pp-cli assets audit --missing-only --agent
  

Versioning & living docs

• rollback — Revert a live site to any prior HTML version stored locally, with the update_key resolved for you.

  Use when a republish shipped bad data; it restores the last-good HTML in one command.

  ht-ml-pp-cli rollback <site_id>
  

• republish — Publish a recurring document under a stable local alias: update in place if the alias exists, or create it once and bind it.

  Pick this for scheduled or daily publishes so the public URL never churns.

  ht-ml-pp-cli republish --as status-report ./status.html
  

Publish safety

• scan — Mechanically scan HTML for leaked secrets and PII before it becomes a public, permanent URL.

  Run before any publish on a person's behalf; it returns a typed exit code so it can gate a pipeline.

  ht-ml-pp-cli scan ./page.html
  

Recipes

Publish a deck and get just the URL

ht-ml-pp-cli publish ./deck.html --agent --select url,site_id

Publish and return only the live URL and id, ready to hand to a downstream step.

Inspect a site's referenced assets compactly

ht-ml-pp-cli sites <site_id> --agent --select status,assets.relative_path,assets.status

Use dotted --select to narrow the verbose site-plus-assets payload to just status and each asset's path and status.

Audit every site for broken images

ht-ml-pp-cli assets audit --missing-only --agent

Cross-site join that lists publicly-visible missing assets the API cannot surface in one call.

List your published sites by title

ht-ml-pp-cli list --sort title --agent --select site_id,title,url

The local registry is the only inventory of what you have shipped (the API has no list endpoint); sort by title to find a page fast.

Recover keys on a second machine

ht-ml-pp-cli keys import ht-ml-keys.vault

Import a passphrase-sealed vault so update and rollback work from another machine.

Usage

Run ht-ml-pp-cli --help for the full command reference and flag list.

Paths & environment variables

This CLI separates local files into four path kinds:

Kind	Contents
config	User-editable settings such as config.toml and saved profiles
data	Durable local data such as data.db
state	Runtime state such as persisted queries, jobs, and teach.log
cache	Regenerable HTTP/cache files

Each kind resolves independently. The ladder is:

1. Per-kind env var: HT_ML_CONFIG_DIR, HT_ML_DATA_DIR, HT_ML_STATE_DIR, or HT_ML_CACHE_DIR
2. --home <dir> for this invocation
3. HT_ML_HOME for a flat relocated root
4. XDG env vars: XDG_CONFIG_HOME, XDG_DATA_HOME, XDG_STATE_HOME, XDG_CACHE_HOME
5. Platform defaults matching existing installs

For containers and agent sandboxes, prefer a single relocated root:

export HT_ML_HOME=/srv/ht-ml
ht-ml-pp-cli doctor

Under HT_ML_HOME=/srv/ht-ml, the four dirs resolve to /srv/ht-ml/config, /srv/ht-ml/data, /srv/ht-ml/state, and /srv/ht-ml/cache.

MCP servers do not receive CLI flags from the host. Put relocation in the host env block:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "ht-ml": {
      "command": "ht-ml-pp-mcp",
      "env": {
        "HT_ML_HOME": "/srv/ht-ml"
      }
    }
  }
}

Precedence matters in fleets: an ambient per-kind variable such as HT_ML_DATA_DIR overrides an explicit --home for that kind. Use HT_ML_HOME or the per-kind variables for durable fleet relocation; treat --home as the weaker per-invocation lever.

Relocation is one-way. Unsetting HT_ML_HOME does not move files back to platform defaults, and doctor cannot find files left under a former root. Move the files manually before unsetting relocation variables.

Existing installs keep working because the platform-default rung matches the legacy layout. Run ht-ml-pp-cli doctor --fail-on warn to check path warnings in automation.

Commands

sites

Inspect ht-ml.app sites

• ht-ml-pp-cli sites <site_id> - Get a site's status and the assets its HTML references (no auth; public read)

Output Formats

# Human-readable table (default in terminal, JSON when piped)
ht-ml-pp-cli sites mock-value

# JSON for scripting and agents
ht-ml-pp-cli sites mock-value --json

# Filter to specific fields
ht-ml-pp-cli sites mock-value --json --select id,name,status

# Dry run — show the request without sending
ht-ml-pp-cli sites mock-value --dry-run

# Agent mode — JSON + compact + no prompts in one flag
ht-ml-pp-cli sites mock-value --agent

Agent Usage

This CLI is designed for AI agent consumption:

• Non-interactive - never prompts, every input is a flag
• Pipeable - --json output to stdout, errors to stderr
• Filterable - --select id,name returns only fields you need
• Previewable - --dry-run shows the request without sending
• Read-only by default - this CLI does not create, update, delete, publish, send, or mutate remote resources
• Offline-friendly - list and audit commands use the local SQLite store when available
• Agent-safe by default - no colors or formatting unless --human-friendly is set

Exit codes: 0 success, 2 usage error, 3 not found, 5 API error, 7 rate limited, 10 config error.

Health Check

ht-ml-pp-cli doctor

Verifies configuration and connectivity to the API.

Configuration

Run ht-ml-pp-cli doctor to see the resolved config, data, state, and cache directories. The platform-default config path is ~/.config/ht-ml-pp-cli/config.toml; --home, HT_ML_HOME, and per-kind env vars can relocate it.

Static request headers can be configured under headers; per-command header overrides take precedence.

Troubleshooting

Not found errors (exit code 3)

• Check the resource ID is correct
• Run the list command to see available items

API-specific

• 401 Unauthorized when updating a site — The site's update_key isn't in your local store. Run ht-ml-pp-cli keys import <vault> if you have a backup, or ht-ml-pp-cli list to confirm the site_id.
• 403 Forbidden when uploading an asset — The asset path must appear in the site's HTML first. Reference it in the HTML, then run ht-ml-pp-cli assets sync <site_id>.
• 422 Unprocessable Entity on publish — The HTML failed ht-ml.app's safety scan. Read the returned message field and revise the HTML.
• I lost a site's update_key — There is no recovery endpoint; without a backup the site is read-only forever. Run ht-ml-pp-cli keys export after publishing so this can't happen again.