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Herve Hildenbrand edited this page Jan 20, 2026 · 1 revision

Configuration

BGP Explorer uses environment variables for configuration. Settings are loaded in priority order:

  1. CLI arguments (highest priority)
  2. Environment variables
  3. .env file
  4. Default values (lowest priority)

Environment Variables

Variable Required Default Description
ANTHROPIC_API_KEY Yes - Your Anthropic Claude API key
BGP_RADAR_PATH No PATH lookup Path to bgp-radar binary

Setting Up Your API Key

Option 1: Environment Variable (Recommended)

export ANTHROPIC_API_KEY=your_key_here

Add this to your shell profile (~/.bashrc, ~/.zshrc, etc.) for persistence.

Option 2: .env File

Copy the example and edit:

cp .env.example .env

Edit .env:

# AI Backend
ANTHROPIC_API_KEY=your_anthropic_key_here

# Optional: bgp-radar path (defaults to PATH lookup)
BGP_RADAR_PATH=/path/to/bgp-radar

Option 3: CLI Argument

uv run bgp-explorer --api-key your_key_here chat

Model Selection

BGP Explorer supports two Claude model tiers:

Model Description Use Case
sonnet (default) Fast, cost-effective General queries, most investigations
opus Most capable Complex multi-step investigations

Both models support extended thinking for deeper analysis.

Setting the Model

# Use default (sonnet)
uv run bgp-explorer chat

# Use opus for complex investigations
uv run bgp-explorer --model opus chat

Thinking Budget

The thinking budget controls how much "thinking" Claude can do before responding. Higher budgets allow for more thorough analysis but increase costs.

Budget Tokens Use Case
Minimum 1024 Quick lookups
Default 8000 Balanced analysis
Maximum 16000 Deep investigations

Setting the Budget

# Set at startup
uv run bgp-explorer --thinking-budget 12000 chat

# Change during chat session
/thinking 12000

RIS Collectors

By default, BGP Explorer uses rrc00 for real-time monitoring. You can specify additional collectors:

uv run bgp-explorer --collectors rrc00,rrc01,rrc10 chat

Common collectors:

  • rrc00 - Amsterdam (default)
  • rrc01 - London
  • rrc10 - Milan
  • rrc14 - Palo Alto

See RIPE RIS collectors for the full list.

Output Formats

Format Description
text (default) Human-readable conversational output
json Structured JSON for programmatic use
both Both text and JSON output 
uv run bgp-explorer --output json chat

Saving Output

Save conversation output to a file:

uv run bgp-explorer --save /path/to/output.txt chat

Next Steps

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