Installation

ContextMD is distributed via NPM as a command-line interface (CLI). You can install it globally on your machine or run it instantly using npx.

Before installing, ensure you have the following:

Node.js: Version 18.0.0 or higher.
OpenAI API Key: ContextMD uses gpt-4o-mini to refine and compress documentation. You can obtain a key from the OpenAI Dashboard.

To use the contextmd command from anywhere in your terminal, install the package globally:

npm install -g contextmd-cli

Once installed, verify the installation by checking the version:

contextmd --version

If you prefer not to install the package globally, you can run ContextMD directly using npx:

npx contextmd-cli <url> [options]

ContextMD requires an OpenAI API key to process and refine the crawled content. You can provide this key in two ways:

Add your key to your shell profile (e.g., .zshrc or .bashrc) or create a .env file in your working directory:

export OPENAI_API_KEY='your_api_key_here'

Pass the key directly during execution using the -k or --key flag:

contextmd https://docs.example.com --key your_api_key_here

Quick Start

Once installed, you can generate your first context file by pointing the utility at a documentation URL:

contextmd https://docs.python.org/3/library/unittest.html

By default, this will crawl up to 100 pages and output a consolidated context.md file in your current directory.