var-cli

A terminal UI (TUI) application for tracking workday time entries with the Elaniin VAR backend API.

Features

• 🔐 Bearer token authentication
• 📊 Weekly time entry view with last 7 days (toggle to 2 weeks)
• 📝 Step-by-step form to create new time entries
• 🏷️ Smart project/tag suggestions based on recent usage
• 📋 Clipboard paste support (Ctrl+V) for API tokens

Installation

Quick install (macOS / Linux)

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/json-nan/var-cli/main/install.sh | sh

Or with a custom install directory:

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/json-nan/var-cli/main/install.sh | INSTALL_DIR=$HOME/bin sh

Manual download

Download the latest release for your platform from the releases page.

Verify installation

var-cli --version

Add to PATH

If the installer used ~/.local/bin but the command is not found, add it to your shell profile:

Bash (~/.bashrc):

export PATH="$HOME/.local/bin:$PATH"

Zsh (~/.zshrc):

export PATH="$HOME/.local/bin:$PATH"

Fish (~/.config/fish/config.fish):

fish_add_path $HOME/.local/bin

Then reload your shell:

source ~/.bashrc   # or ~/.zshrc

Usage

var-cli

Keys

Key	Action
n	New time entry
r	Refresh entries
a	Toggle 7 days / 2 weeks view
u	Update (if available)
q	Quit

New entry form

1. Date — defaults to today (YYYY-MM-DD)
2. Description — what you worked on
3. Project — pick from frequently-used projects first
4. Tags — multi-select with Space, frequently-used first
5. Time — minutes (e.g. 60, 480)
6. Billable — toggle Yes/No

Press Esc at any step to cancel.

Getting your API Token

1. Log in to VAR
2. Open DevTools → Network tab
3. Find a /projects request
4. Copy the Bearer token from the Authorization header
5. Paste it into var-cli with Ctrl+V

Development

go run main.go

Testing self-updates locally

A local test server is included to verify the update flow without touching real releases.

# 1. Start the test server (in one terminal)
go run scripts/testserver.go

# 2. Build var-cli with a fake old version (in another terminal)
go build -ldflags="-X main.version=v0.1.0" -o /tmp/var-cli-test ./main.go

# 3. Run it pointing to the local test server
VAR_CLI_API_URL=http://localhost:9999 \
VAR_CLI_DOWNLOAD_URL=http://localhost:9999 \
/tmp/var-cli-test

# 4. In the app, press 'u' to trigger the update
# 5. Verify the update worked:
/tmp/var-cli-test --version
# → var-cli 99.0.0

License

MIT