Command Line

Command line

Raster's command-line tool is bin/raster. Run it with PHP from your project folder:

php bin/raster <command> [options]

php bin/raster help lists the commands. Most commands work on one app: application/ by default, or another with RASTER_APP=demo php bin/raster …. They run in development unless you set RASTER_ENV (see Settings and environments).

Many commands take --json for output a script can read. Commands exit with code 0 on success and 1 (or 2 for wrong usage) otherwise, so you can use them in scripts and CI pipelines.

Everyday

serve

php bin/raster serve [--port=8000] [--host=localhost]

Runs the site with PHP's built-in web server. For development only; see Deploying to production for servers.

lint

php bin/raster lint [--fix] [--json] [--theme=name] [--all-themes]

Checks every view of the theme: annotation spelling, blocks that aren't closed or don't nest, models and methods that don't exist (with the nearest real name), the number of arguments, reserved CMS names, attributes an @ annotation sets that the tag doesn't have, dry fragments that don't exist, forms nobody handles, alerts nobody raises, validation blocks that can never show, routes to missing views, event bindings to missing methods, and named SQL queries that don't exist.

Problems are errors (the page won't work) or warnings (probably a mistake). Exit code 1 means at least one error.

--fix repairs what has only one right answer (annotation spacing, short closing tags) and then reports the rest.

application/views/default/team.html:11:20: error: Model 'office' has no public method 'todya' (application/models/office/office.php); did you mean 'today'?

render

php bin/raster render /about
php bin/raster render '/bookings?stylist=Ana' --as=editor

Prints the HTML of a URL without a web server. Exits with 1 when the page answers with an error (404, 500), which makes it handy in tests. A query string fills ?… as a browser's would.

--as renders the page as someone: an account's email or username, or a role (editor, admin, member) for a stand-in with that role. As staff, it also prints on stderr what the in-page editor can do on the page: how many fields it can edit, the items, and each list with whether it gets a card for a new item. Use it after changing a page staff edit, to see that editing still works there. It refuses to run in production, where it would show any account's pages without a password: check on a development copy.

schema

php bin/raster schema [--apply] [--check] [--rename=table.old:new] [--drop=table.column] [--drop=table] [--force] [--json]

Compares the content model your templates declare with the database, and changes the database. See The CMS.

doctor

php bin/raster doctor [--json]

A health check: PHP version and extensions, whether the app needs upgrade steps, whether framework files were edited, whether .htaccess has every protection rule, whether data/ and media/ are writable, template errors, database drift, deprecated features in use, and in production the site address, mail transport, MCP token and RASTER_ENV. Exit code 1 when something must be fixed. Run it on the server after every deploy.

Accounts

php bin/raster user <email or username> [--role=admin|editor|member] [--password=…] [--name="…"]
php bin/raster users

user creates an account, or updates an existing one. A new account gets the role admin unless --role says otherwise, and a random password, printed, unless --password gives one. For an existing account it changes only what you give: without --role it keeps the role, without --password it keeps the password, and it says what it kept. users lists accounts with their role and last log-in. See Accounts and roles.

Newsletter

php bin/raster send <url> [--to=email] [--subject="…"] [--dry-run] [--again]

Sends a page of the site as a newsletter issue. Needs RASTER_URL (or the site_url setting). See Newsletter.

Publishing

export

php bin/raster export <folder> [--url=https://example.com/] [--skip=/path] [--clean]

Writes the whole site as static files. See Static export.

deploy

php bin/raster deploy --config=apache
php bin/raster deploy --config=nginx --host=example.com --root=/var/www/site --socket=unix//run/php/php8.3-fpm.sock
php bin/raster deploy --config=caddy --host=example.com --root=/var/www/site

Prints the web-server configuration that keeps private files private. See Deploying to production.

For agents and tooling

Command	Prints
php bin/raster describe [--json] [--sections=pages,vocabulary]	the whole site in one answer: how URLs reach views, pages and collections, every callable model method, settings, lint state. Sections: site, routing, pages, collections, vocabulary, settings, lint, schema, views.
php bin/raster vocabulary [--json]	every model with its methods and their parameters, named SQL queries, events and listeners, reserved names
php bin/raster annotations [--json]	the annotation grammar, as data
php bin/raster mcp	runs the MCP server over standard input/output
php bin/raster cache clear	throws the page cache away, after editing views, models or the database by hand

These are also useful to humans: vocabulary is the quickest way to see what a template can call. See Working with AI agents.

Projects and versions

Command	Does
php bin/raster new <folder>	creates a new site in an empty folder from this copy of Raster
php bin/raster version	the framework's version and each app's
php bin/raster update [latest|2.1.0|<branch>|<folder>|<file.tar.gz>] [--dry-run] [--force]	replaces the framework files with another release, then upgrades every app
php bin/raster upgrade [--dry-run]	runs the upgrade steps this app still needs

See Updating Raster.