name	consult-llm
description	How to invoke the consult-llm CLI. Canonical reference for the invocation contract, flags, stdin/stdout format, and multi-turn. Load this before calling consult-llm from any workflow skill (/consult, /collab, /debate, /collab-vs, /debate-vs).
allowed-tools	Bash

Reference for invoking the consult-llm CLI. Workflow skills delegate here for mechanics; they focus on orchestration.

Invocation

Run consult-llm with the prompt on stdin, using a quoted heredoc.

cat <<'EOF' | consult-llm -m gemini -f src/foo.rs -f src/bar.rs
<prompt body>
EOF

Rules:

• ALWAYS use <<'EOF' (quoted). The quotes prevent the shell from expanding $var, backticks, or escapes inside the prompt. Unquoted heredocs corrupt prompts.
• Fallback to --prompt-file <path> if the prompt contains the heredoc terminator, or on Windows/PowerShell. Write the prompt to a temp file, then consult-llm --prompt-file /tmp/prompt.txt ….
• Stdout layout. First line is [model:<id>] [thread_id:<id>], then a blank line, then the response body. In --web mode the prefix is just [model:<id>] (no thread).
• Multi-turn. Read [thread_id:xxx] from line 1 and pass it back with -t <id> on the next call. Thread IDs are opaque strings — don't modify them. Not portable across backends.
• Stderr carries progress/spinner output. Ignore it.
• Exit codes. 0 success, 1 backend/network error (includes thread-not-found), 2 usage error, 3 configuration error (missing API key, unsupported backend).

Models

Selectors and allowed models resolvable in this environment (availability depends on which API keys are configured):

!`consult-llm models`

Pass a selector or an exact model ID to -m. Selectors with -> - have no configured API key and will fail.

Flags

Flag	Purpose
-m, --model <selector|id>	See "Models" above
-f, --file <path>	Repeatable. File context
-t, --thread-id <id>	Resume a multi-turn conversation
--task <mode>	general (default), review, debug, plan, create
--web	Copy formatted prompt to clipboard, exit 0
--prompt-file <path>	Read prompt from file instead of stdin
--diff-files <path>	Repeatable. Include git diff for this file
--diff-base <ref>	Base ref for diff (default HEAD)
--diff-repo <path>	Repo path (default cwd)

Run consult-llm --help for the authoritative flag list.