kayactl

Command-line interface for KayaDB.

kayactl is the operator and debugging tool for the workspace. It can talk either to:

• a local embedded engine on disk, or
• a running kayadb-server over TCP.

It also includes format-inspection and recovery-report commands for WAL, SSTable, and manifest files.

Command groups

Local engine mode

Operate directly on a data directory:

• put <key> <value>
• get <key>
• delete <key>
• scan <prefix>
• stats
• recover --dry-run

Server mode

Send commands to a running node with --server <addr>:

• put <key> <value>
• get <key>
• delete <key>
• scan <prefix>
• health
• status

Inspect mode

Inspect on-disk files without custom tooling:

• inspect wal <path>
• inspect sstable <path>
• inspect manifest <path>

Examples

Local mode

cargo run -p kayactl -- put hello world

cargo run -p kayactl -- get hello

cargo run -p kayactl -- scan he

cargo run -p kayactl -- stats

cargo run -p kayactl -- recover --dry-run

Server mode

cargo run -p kayactl -- --server 127.0.0.1:7379 put hello world

cargo run -p kayactl -- --server 127.0.0.1:7379 get hello

cargo run -p kayactl -- --server 127.0.0.1:7379 health

cargo run -p kayactl -- --server 127.0.0.1:7379 status

JSON output

Most commands support --json for machine-readable output:

cargo run -p kayactl -- --json stats

cargo run -p kayactl -- --server 127.0.0.1:7379 --json status

Flags

• --data <dir> — local engine data directory (default: ./data)
• --durability strict|relaxed — local write durability mode
• --server <addr> — target remote server instead of local engine
• --json — print JSON output when supported

Why this tool matters

KayaDB emphasizes inspectability. kayactl is a major part of that story because it lets you:

• inspect storage formats by hand,
• verify recovery state after a crash,
• poke a cluster without writing application code,
• compare local and remote behavior quickly.

Related crates

• ../kaya-engine — local embedded engine API
• ../kaya-server — remote TCP server process
• ../kaya-wal / ../kaya-lsm — inspected file formats

See the CLI reference and workspace README for more.