bai | a small Linux shell helper that generates shell commands

Posted by transfire@reddit | linux | View on Reddit | 14 comments

I built a tiny command-line tool called bai that takes a plain-English request and turns it into a shell command.

Example:

$ bai find large log files modified this week

It prints a command and copies it to the clipboard so you can paste, inspect, edit, or ignore it. It does not execute commands automatically.

BYOK: works with Anthropic or OpenAI
supports Bash, Zsh, Fish, Dash, Nu, and a few others
config can live in ~/.config/bai/
has --explain, --strict, --json, and --show-config
packages are available for Arch, Debian/Ubuntu, and Fedora
written in Crystal, so it's a compiled executable

The main design goal is to keep it boring and safe: one request in, one command out, human always stays in the loop.

Repo: https://github.com/trans/bai Packages: https://github.com/trans/bai/releases/tag/v0.4.2

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Contrite42@reddit

fzf + ripgrep + fd does most of the work. add bat if you want syntax-highlighted previews.

the thing that actually changed my workflow was fzf's **<tab> completion. type vim **<tab>, fuzzy-pick the file, done. stopped typing paths almost entirely after that.

ripgrep alone is worth it btw, grepping a big repo went from "go get coffee" to instant.

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Savings_Walk_1022@reddit

my computer is lagging looking at this website 😞

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The CSS performance issue I believe was caused by `backdrop-filter: blur(...)`. `backdrop-filter` makes the browser blur whatever is behind translucent elements during compositing, which can be expensive on some Linux/browser/GPU setups. I removed those filters and the old floating background text animation. Hopefully that solves the issue.

Thank you for letting me know!

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transfire@reddit (OP)

Oh the classic “works on my machine”. Thanks I’ll fix it.

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Adorable-One362@reddit

Just install command fails on line 6 in "build" on opensuse tumbeweed.

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transfire@reddit (OP)

Thanks I look into it.

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transfire@reddit (OP)

Fixed and I did an end-to-end install via a Podman VM instance of openSUSE, and it worked. So 0.4.3 should be good to go. (https://github.com/trans/bai/releases).

I appreciate you letting me know about the issue. Hopefully it is fully resolved now. Thank you.

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TheG0AT0fAllTime@reddit

Vibecoded fuckass trash

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transfire@reddit (OP)

Sigh.

As far as programs go, this is about as simple as it gets. So who cares if the code isn't all neat and tidy, as long as it works? And if you think I vibe coded it because I don't know how to program, well you haven't looked at my Github account. I've been coding for decades.

Actually think about this: what has AI let me do? I could have coded this by hand. And spent a handful of weekends just on this a little tool (ARCH, Debian and RPM packages alone can take days to hand craft.) But right now, I have Claude Code fixing the RPM, testing it against a Podman instance of both Fedora and OpenSuSE. (I made a mistake not doing that sooner, but correcting in now). I could have spent a week doing that myself. But I have other things I prefer to, Claude did in in 30 minutes.

It's a trade-off and for a while, yeah you have to deal with some "sloppy" code. But it is only going to improve. So better to get used to working with AI now, so we can learn how to work with it and get it to write better code.

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mina86ng@reddit

Make it run locally and then we’ll talk.

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SystemAxis@reddit

A lot of these tools fall apart when they try to be too clever. Keeping it to 'generate a command and let the user review it' seems like the right approach.