cmd model

nself model

List, pull, remove, update, and benchmark local AI models via Ollama.

Synopsis

nself model <subcommand> [flags]

Description

nself model manages AI models stored in the local Ollama model registry. It covers the full model lifecycle: browsing what is installed, downloading new models, removing models to reclaim disk space, re-pulling for the latest weights, and running a repeatable latency and throughput benchmark.

All subcommands talk to the Ollama API. The host is resolved from NSELF_OLLAMA_HOST, falling back to PLUGIN_AI_OLLAMA_URL, and defaulting to http://localhost:11434. The Ollama plugin must be installed and the stack running:

nself plugin install ollama
nself start

Subcommands

Subcommand	Description
list	Show all pulled models with name, size, and modification date
pull	Download a model from the Ollama registry
remove	Delete a model from the local store to free disk space
update	Re-pull a model to pick up the latest tag version
benchmark	Run a standard prompt N times and report tok/s and p99 latency

Flags

nself model list

Flag	Default	Description
--json	false	Emit JSON output instead of the table

nself model pull

No flags beyond the required positional argument.

nself model remove

Aliases: rm, delete. No flags beyond the required positional argument.

nself model update

No flags beyond the required positional argument.

nself model benchmark

Flag	Default	Description
--prompt	""	Custom prompt to use (default: Merkle tree question)
--runs	5	Number of inference runs (higher = more stable p99)
--json	false	Emit JSON output

Environment variables

Variable	Description
NSELF_OLLAMA_HOST	Full base URL for the Ollama API (e.g. http://localhost:11434)
PLUGIN_AI_OLLAMA_URL	Alternative URL shared with the nself ai command tree
NSELF_OLLAMA_DEFAULT_MODEL	Model name marked as [default] in nself model list
NSELF_OLLAMA_TIMEOUT_SECONDS	Request timeout in seconds (default: 120)

Examples

# List all downloaded models
nself model list

# List as JSON for scripting
nself model list --json

# Pull the gemma-3-4b model (good for CPU-only machines)
nself model pull gemma-3-4b

# Pull a specific tag
nself model pull llama3.2:3b

# Remove a model to free disk
nself model remove gemma-3-4b
nself model rm llama3.2:3b

# Re-pull to pick up updated weights
nself model update llama3.2:3b

# Benchmark with the default prompt (5 runs)
nself model benchmark llama3.2:3b

# Benchmark with a custom prompt and more runs
nself model benchmark llama3.2:3b --prompt "Explain backpressure in 3 sentences." --runs 20

# Benchmark output as JSON
nself model benchmark llama3.2:3b --json

Common models

Model	Size	Notes
gemma-3-4b	~2.5 GB	Good for CPU-only inference
llama3.2:3b	~2.0 GB	Fast general chat
llama3.2:7b	~4.7 GB	Higher quality, needs 8 GB RAM
mistral	~4.1 GB	Good instruct model

See Also

• cmd-ai — AI assistant commands (uses the default model)
• cmd-claw — ɳClaw plugin management
• Plugin-Overview — list of AI plugins

← Commands | Home →