CLI

adotenv-cli provides command-line tools built on the library APIs.

Commands

adotenv-cli [--dialect portable|node|python|compose|docker] <command> ...

get <file> <key>
check [--format human|json|github] [--source] [--recursive] [--exclude <path>] <path>...
fmt [--write|--check] [--sort] [--recursive] [--exclude <path>] <path>...
diff [--format human|matrix|json] [--json] <baseline> <file>...
example <file>
load <directory> [mode]
set <file> <key> <value>
run <directory> [mode] -- <program> [args...]

check reads one or more files or directories. fmt formats, checks or writes in place. diff treats the first file as the baseline. run loads a cascade and starts a child process with those values. The parent environment is not changed.

Diagnostics

Human output contains path, one-based line and column, severity, code, message and a summary. Values are not printed by default because they may be secrets. --source adds source lines and carets for human output only.

check --format json uses this machine schema:

{"version":1,"files":[{"path":"...","diagnostics":[]}]}

The exact fields, diagnostic codes, severities and spans are stable contracts.

check --format github emits GitHub Actions workflow annotations. The field names and escaping are stable.

diff --format json emits one result per candidate file. The versioned schema is stable. Human tables are not a machine contract.

Discovery

check --recursive and fmt --recursive find .env and .env.* below each root. With no path they use ..

--exclude is repeatable and relative to each root. Discovery skips .git, target, node_modules and symbolic links.

Input and output

File-reading commands accept - or --stdin for standard input. fmt prints formatted text unless --write or --check is selected.

On Unix, --write uses a same-directory atomic rename. On Windows, it writes a temporary file and attempts a direct replace. If that fails, it moves the old file to a backup, installs the new file and restores the backup on error. The Windows fallback is not crash-atomic.

Exit codes

0: success or no differences.
1: differences, diagnostics or a required formatting change.
2: usage, read or write failure.

diff exits 1 when any candidate differs. fmt --check exits 1 when a file would change. run returns the child exit code.

Limits

Command substitution from loaded files is disabled. Use the library or the adotenv-process crate for other workflows.

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