Kagi open sourced Ask: a bash script for quick AI queries in the shell

2 hours ago 2

A lightweight bash script for querying AI models via the OpenRouter API, optimized for direct, executable output.

# Clone and setup git clone https://github.com/kagisearch/ask.git cd ask chmod +x ask sudo cp ask /usr/local/bin/ # Make sure you have you OpenRouter API key export OPENROUTER_API_KEY="your-api-key-here" # Test it > ask remove lines in file1 that appear in file2 grep -vFf file2 file1 > file3 && mv file3 file1 [inception/mercury-coder via Inception - 0.66s - 20.9 tok/s]

We also provide a handy install script.

ask ffmpeg command to convert mp4 to gif

# Default model (Mercury Coder - optimized for code) ask find files larger than 20mb # Shorthand flags for quick model switching ask -c "prompt" # Mercury Coder (default, best for code) ask -g "prompt" # Gemini 2.5 Flash (fast, general purpose) ask -s "prompt" # Claude Sonnet 4 (complex reasoning) ask -k "prompt" # Kimi K2 (long context) ask -q "prompt" # Qwen 235B (large model) # Custom model by full name ask -m "openai/gpt-4o" "Explain this concept"

Specify provider order for fallback support:

ask --provider "cerebras,together" "Generate code"

This will try Cerebras first, then fall back to Together if needed.

# Custom system prompt ask --system "You are a pirate" "Tell me about sailing" # Disable system prompt for raw model behavior ask -r "What is 2+2?"

Get responses as they're generated:

ask --stream "Tell me a long story"

echo "Fix this code: print('hello world)" | ask cat script.py | ask "Review this code"

Option Description

-c	Use Mercury Coder (default)
-g	Use Google Gemini 2.5 Flash
-s	Use Claude Sonnet 4
-k	Use Moonshotai Kimi K2
-q	Use Qwen3 235B
-m MODEL	Use custom model
-r	Disable system prompt
--stream	Enable streaming output
--system	Set custom system prompt
--provider	Set provider order (comma-separated)
-h, --help	Show help message

# Get executable commands directly ask "Command to find files larger than 100MB" # Output: find . -type f -size +100M ask "ffmpeg command to convert mp4 to gif" # Output: ffmpeg -i input.mp4 -vf "fps=10,scale=320:-1:flags=lanczos" output.gif

# Generate code snippets ask "Python function to calculate factorial" # Code review cat script.py | ask "Find potential bugs in this code"

# Calculations ask "What is 18% of 2450?" # Output: 441 # Technical questions ask "What port does PostgreSQL use?" # Output: 5432

# Chain commands ask "List all Python files" | ask "Generate a script to check syntax of these files" # Use with other tools docker ps -a | ask "Which containers are using the most memory?"