Command Line Overview

clice is one binary. Editors launch clice serve and talk to it over LSP; the other subcommands drive the same engine from a terminal, sharing its compilation database handling, caches and index.

Command	What it does	Page
serve	Start the language server. Editors do this for you, see the editor setup.	editors
lint	Run clang-tidy over every translation unit with a worker pool.	lint
index	Index a project ahead of time so the server starts warm.	index
format	Format the project's files with clang-format.	format
inspect	Run one feature on a source file and print the raw result as JSON.
command	Show the commands a file compiles with, and convert compile commands for other tools.	command
query	Ask the persisted index about symbols, references, call graphs and files.	query
refactor	Rename a symbol across the project from the persisted index.	refactor
analyze	Report facts for refactoring, such as module dependencies and cycles.	analyze
modularize	Wrap third-party libraries as C++20 modules, rewrite the program into module units.	modularize
scan	Scan the include and module dependencies of the build, and time the scan.	scan

inspect has no page: clice inspect --help documents its operations and options.

Arguments

Every subcommand takes its arguments the same way:

clice <command> [<operation>] [<target>...] [--option...]

• A command that does several things names the one to do by a word after it: clice query references, clice index stats, clice analyze modules edge. A command whose own job comes first runs it when no word follows: clice index indexes, clice analyze modules gives the overview, clice command <file> shows the file's commands. --help after any command or operation lists what it takes.
• The target, the symbol or file an operation is about, follows the operation: clice query references "shapes::Circle::area", clice query document-symbols src/main.cpp. A symbol is named by a locator wherever one is taken; a file by its path, relative to the current directory or absolute, as is every other path on the command line, such as a partition or an output directory.
• Options come after the operation. An option takes several values by being repeated: --scope 'src/**' --scope 'include/**'.
• --workspace <dir> names the project root; without it a command works on the project above the current directory, as git finds its repository: the nearest directory holding a clice.toml, a .clice/config.toml or a compile_commands.json, directly or in its build/ directory, else the current directory itself (inspect looks up from the file, as the editor does). A configuration the command cannot take — a file that does not parse, a value of the wrong type, an option it cannot honor — fails it with exit code 2, each problem named with its place in the file; --configuration <tag> pins the build configuration over the selection persisted from the editor (see build configurations); -j, --jobs <n> is how many units or files index, lint and format work on at once; CLICE_LOG_LEVEL in the environment sets what is logged to stderr, warnings and errors by default (serve, whose stderr an editor shows, from info); the session logs of serve, index and lint keep info whatever it is.

Exit codes

Every command ends with one of four exit codes, which its page details:

Code	Meaning
0	The command did what it was asked.
1	It did it, and the answer is negative: lint findings, a file to format, a symbol or file not found, a rename conflict, a unit that failed to index.
2	It could not do it: the arguments or the configuration do not parse, there is nothing to work on (no project, no compilation database, no unit), the index cannot be opened.
130	It was interrupted.