AO CLI Catalog

ao is a thin CLI over the local AO daemon. Every command is ao <command> --help for the authoritative flag list.

Command	What it does	When to use	Details
spawn	Spawn a project worker, orchestrator, or projectless standalone worker	Starting a new task or issue	commands/spawn.md
session	Manage agent sessions (list, kill, rename, restore, etc.)	Inspecting or controlling running/terminated sessions	commands/session.md
agent	Inspect installed harnesses and launch readiness	Choosing or diagnosing an agent harness	ao agent ls --refresh
pr	Merge a PR or resolve its review threads	Completing a reviewed change	ao pr merge / ao pr resolve-comments
project	Register, inspect, configure, or remove projects	Setting up or managing repos AO knows about	commands/project.md
automation	Manage durable recurring session automations	Creating, editing, disabling, deleting, and inspecting scheduled runs	commands/automation.md
cue	Create or list reusable project Cues	Saving a repetitive command or agent task at the user's request	commands/cue.md
orchestrator	List orchestrator sessions	Viewing which sessions are orchestrators	commands/orchestrator.md
review	Start, list, cancel, or submit AO's native reviewer for a worker's PR (default: this session)	Getting an adversarial review of an AO session's PR; never spawn a worker to review	commands/review.md
send	Send a message to a running agent session	Correcting or directing a live agent	commands/send.md
report	Persist a meaningful worker report	Checkpoints, blockers, decisions, outputs, and completion	commands/report.md
preview	Start a session-owned app or open an exact URL/file	Running and showing the worker's relevant app, Markdown, HTML, PDF, or image	commands/preview.md
render	Show a self-contained HTML page inline in a chat thread	Answering with a chart, table, diagram, or mockup	commands/render.md
browser	Inspect and control the session's shared live browser	Verifying a web app through snapshots, interactions, waits, screenshots, console, and errors	commands/browser.md
start	Fetch (if needed) and open the AO desktop app	Launching the app	commands/start.md
stop	Stop the AO daemon	Shutting down AO	commands/stop.md
status	Show daemon status	Verifying the daemon is up and healthy	commands/status.md
doctor	Run local health checks	Diagnosing AO setup problems	commands/doctor.md
import	Import projects from a legacy AO install	Migrating from the old flat-file store	commands/import.md
version	Print version information	Checking installed version	-
completion	Generate shell completion scripts	Setting up tab completion	-

Conventions

• Most read commands accept --json for machine-readable output.
• -p / --project scopes session subcommand lookups to one project.
• Session and project ids are shown by ao session ls and ao project ls.
• To refer to a session in AO Chat or the AO terminal, use the canonical in-app link ao://sessions/{project-id}/{session-id}. Read commands/session.md for identity, encoding, and safety rules before constructing one.
• When the user asks to save a repeatable task as a Cue, use ao cue list --json to check existing definitions, then ao cue create. An agent Cue stores a reusable instruction; a command Cue stores an exact shell command. This agent-facing command can create and read Cues, but cannot edit or delete them. Direct the user to project settings for changes to existing Cues.
• --agent is an alias for --harness on ao spawn.
• Every command accepts -h / --help for the full flag list.
• For frontend launch, preview selection, or artifact handoff, read commands/preview.md before acting. Its static-file, project-runtime, and automatic-handoff rules are load-bearing.
• For page inspection, interaction, or request diagnosis, read commands/browser.md. It defines shared-tab behavior and the opt-in network policy.

Use references.md only when a natural-language request does not map clearly to a command above.