Retrieval CLI Commands

Command-line interface for knowledge indexing and retrieval

Overview

The retrieval CLI provides unified commands for indexing documents and querying knowledge bases. These commands are Agent-first and use the same retrieval pipeline as the Python SDK.

Commands

praisonai index - Index Documents

Index documents into a knowledge base for later retrieval.

# Index a directory
praisonai index ./docs

# Index specific files
praisonai index paper.pdf report.txt

# Index with custom collection name
praisonai index ./data --collection research

# Index with verbose output
praisonai index ./docs --verbose

Options

Option	Description	Default
--collection, -c	Collection/knowledge base name	default
--config, -f	Config file path (YAML)	None
--verbose, -v	Verbose output	False
--profile	Enable performance profiling	False
--profile-out	Save profile to JSON file	None
--profile-top	Top N items in profile	20

praisonai query - Query with Answer and Citations

Query the knowledge base and get a structured answer with citations.

# Basic query
praisonai query "What are the main findings?"

# Query specific collection
praisonai query "Summarize the document" --collection research

# Query with more results
praisonai query "Key points?" --top-k 10

# Query without citations
praisonai query "Summary?" --no-citations

# Query with hybrid retrieval and reranking
praisonai query "What is the conclusion?" --hybrid --rerank

Options

Option	Description	Default
--collection, -c	Collection to query	default
--top-k, -k	Number of results to retrieve	5
--min-score	Minimum relevance score (0.0-1.0)	0.0
--hybrid	Use hybrid retrieval (dense + keyword)	False
--rerank	Enable reranking of results	False
--citations/--no-citations	Include citations	True
--citations-mode	Citations mode: append, inline, hidden	append
--max-context-tokens	Maximum context tokens	4000
--config, -f	Config file path	None
--verbose, -v	Verbose output	False
--profile	Enable performance profiling	False

praisonai search - Search Without LLM

Search the knowledge base and return raw results without LLM generation.

# Basic search
praisonai search "capital of France"

# Search with more results
praisonai search "main findings" --collection research --top-k 10

# Hybrid search
praisonai search "key concepts" --hybrid

Options

Option	Description	Default
--collection, -c	Collection to search	default
--top-k, -k	Number of results to retrieve	5
--hybrid	Use hybrid retrieval	False
--config, -f	Config file path	None
--verbose, -v	Verbose output	False

Examples

Complete Workflow

# 1. Index your documents
praisonai index ./company_docs --collection company

# 2. Query with citations
praisonai query "What is our vacation policy?" --collection company

# 3. Search for specific terms
praisonai search "remote work" --collection company --top-k 10

Using Config Files

Create a config file retrieval.yaml:

knowledge:
  vector_store:
    provider: chroma
    config:
      collection_name: my_docs
      path: .praison/knowledge

retrieval:
  top_k: 10
  rerank: true
  max_context_tokens: 8000

Use with commands:

praisonai index ./docs --config retrieval.yaml
praisonai query "Summary?" --config retrieval.yaml

Performance Profiling

Profile indexing and query performance:

# Profile indexing
praisonai index ./large_corpus --profile --profile-out index_profile.json

# Profile query
praisonai query "Complex question" --profile --profile-out query_profile.json

# View profile results
cat query_profile.json

Verbose Mode

Get detailed output for debugging:

praisonai query "What is the answer?" --verbose

Output includes:

• Collection being queried
• Retrieval strategy used
• Number of sources found
• Relevance scores
• Elapsed time

Environment Variables

Variable	Description
OPENAI_API_KEY	OpenAI API key for embeddings and generation
ANTHROPIC_API_KEY	Anthropic API key (if using Claude)

Comparison with Legacy Commands

The unified retrieval commands replace the separate knowledge and rag command families:

Legacy	New Unified
praisonai knowledge add	praisonai index
praisonai rag query	praisonai query
praisonai knowledge search	praisonai search

The legacy commands are still available but marked as deprecated. Use the new unified commands for all new projects.

Next Steps

• Agent Retrieval (Python) - Use retrieval in Python code
• Knowledge Concepts - Learn about knowledge bases
• CLI Reference - Full CLI documentation