CLI Installation

The Krometrail CLI exposes the same capabilities as the MCP tools, but as shell commands. Many agent harnesses prefer CLI tools for their transparency and composability — the CLI gives agents explicit, scriptable access to the full debugging toolset. It's also handy for convenience operations like krometrail doctor. Sessions persist across commands via a background daemon.

Options

bunx / npx (no install)

Run without installing globally. Useful for one-off use or CI:

bunx krometrail doctor
npx krometrail doctor

npm global install

npm install -g krometrail
krometrail --version

Standalone binary

Install with a single command — no Node.js or Bun required:

curl -fsSL https://krometrail.dev/install.sh | sh

Or download a specific binary from GitHub releases:

# Linux x64 (example)
curl -L https://github.com/nklisch/krometrail/releases/latest/download/krometrail-linux-x64 \
  -o ~/.local/bin/krometrail
chmod +x ~/.local/bin/krometrail

Binaries are available for Linux (x64, arm64), macOS (x64, Apple Silicon), and Windows.

Build from source

Requires Bun:

git clone https://github.com/nklisch/krometrail
cd krometrail
bun install
bun run build        # Linux/macOS binary
bun run build:all    # All platforms

The compiled binary is at dist/krometrail.

Verify

krometrail --version
krometrail doctor

doctor shows which language debuggers are installed. Install missing debuggers for the languages you need:

Language	Install command
Python	pip install debugpy
Go	go install github.com/go-delve/delve/cmd/dlv@latest
Java	Download java-debug-adapter
C/C++	sudo apt install gdb (GDB 14+) or install lldb-dap

Node.js and Rust (CodeLLDB) adapters download their debuggers automatically on first use.

Session Daemon

The CLI manages sessions via a background daemon that starts automatically on krometrail launch and shuts down after all sessions end. This means consecutive commands share a session:

krometrail launch "python app.py" --break order.py:147
# daemon starts, session created

krometrail continue
# same session, no server lifecycle to manage

krometrail stop
# session ends, daemon idles then shuts down

The daemon socket lives at $XDG_RUNTIME_DIR/krometrail.sock or ~/.krometrail/krometrail.sock.