qql-cli

Command-line interface and interactive REPL for QQL. Connects to Qdrant, executes queries, converts REST payloads, dumps collections, and runs an in-process qdrant-edge backend.

Installation

# Default build (gRPC + REST)
cargo build --release -p qql-cli

# Full build with local edge execution
cargo build --release -p qql-cli --features edge

# REST-only (smaller binary)
cargo build --release -p qql-cli --no-default-features --features rest

# binary at target/release/qql

Commands

exec — Run a single QQL query

qql exec "SHOW COLLECTIONS"
qql exec --json "QUERY 'machine learning' FROM docs LIMIT 5"

execute — Run multiple queries from a .qql script file

qql execute script.qql
qql execute --stop-on-error migrate.qql

explain — Show execution plan without running

qql explain "QUERY 'search' FROM docs LIMIT 10"

connect — Start interactive REPL

Opens a REPL connected to Qdrant:

qql connect --url http://localhost:6333

Then type QQL directly:

qql> SHOW COLLECTIONS;
qql> QUERY 'similar to this' FROM docs LIMIT 10;
qql> UPSERT INTO docs (id, vector, payload) VALUES ...
qql> exit

Built-in REPL commands: help, explain <query>, execute <file>, dump <name> <file>, exit/quit.

convert — Convert Qdrant REST JSON payloads to QQL

Reads a REST JSON payload (from file or stdin) and outputs the equivalent QQL statement:

qql convert search_payload.json
echo '{"collection": "docs", "limit": 5, "with_payload": true}' | qql convert

dump — Export a collection to .qql script

Full collection export as a replayable .qql script:

1. CREATE COLLECTION reconstructed from live vector schema (size, distance, sparse)
2. CREATE INDEX statements from payload indexes (when reported by Qdrant)
3. Batched UPSERT statements with real vector: values (not re-embed stubs)

Uses cursor pagination (AFTER / next_page_offset) and requests vectors on every scroll page. Safe for multi-batch collections and streams to disk.

qql dump docs docs_export.qql
qql dump --batch-size 500 docs docs_export.qql
qql dump docs out.qql --json   # machine-readable stats

Reload with:

qql execute docs_export.qql

doctor — Check Qdrant connection health

qql doctor
qql doctor --json

--edge — Run normal commands against local qdrant-edge

The edge backend is an optional feature because FastEmbed and ONNX materially increase compile time and binary size. Configure it once:

# Local ONNX embeddings
qql config edge \
  --data-dir ./qql-data \
  --model bge-small-en-v1.5 \
  --cache-dir ~/.cache/fastembed

# Or an OpenAI-compatible HTTP embedder
qql config edge \
  --data-dir ./qql-data \
  --embedder http \
  --embed-url http://localhost:11434/v1/embeddings \
  --embed-model nomic-embed-text --embed-dim 768

Then select the configured backend with the global flag:

qql --edge exec "QUERY 'vector search' FROM docs USING dense LIMIT 5"
qql --edge execute migration.qql
qql --edge connect
qql --edge dump docs docs.qql
qql --edge doctor

Configuration is stored at ~/.qql/edge.json. CLI selection has the normal precedence: environment overrides the saved file, while --edge selects the backend. Supported overrides are QQL_EDGE_DATA_DIR, QQL_EDGE_ON_DISK, QQL_EDGE_EMBEDDER, QQL_EDGE_MODEL, QQL_EDGE_CACHE_DIR, EMBED_URL, EMBED_KEY, EMBED_MODEL, and EMBED_DIM.

version — Print version info

qql version

Configuration

# Global flag (overrides QDRANT_URL)
qql --url http://localhost:6333 exec "SHOW COLLECTIONS"

Set via environment variables:

Persistent config loaded from ~/.qql/config.json (auto-created on first use). Fields mirror QqlConfig:

{
  "url": "http://localhost:6333",
  "secret": null,
  "embedding_endpoint": "http://localhost:11434/v1/embeddings",
  "embedding_model": "nomic-embed-text",
  "embedding_dimension": 768
}

Feature Flags

.qql Script Format

Statements are separated by semicolons. Supports all QQL statements:

CREATE COLLECTION docs WITH VECTOR size 384 distance Cosine;
UPSERT INTO docs (id, vector, payload) VALUES
    (1, [0.1, 0.2, ...], {"text": "first document"}),
    (2, [0.3, 0.4, ...], {"text": "second document"});
QUERY 'search' FROM docs LIMIT 10;

Comments with -- and blank lines are ignored.