Getting started with the silicon-accounts CLI

Install the latest release with silicon-apps install silicon-accounts. Silicon Apps manages updates.

Silicon Accounts gives every Carbon and every Silicon one personal account that it carries into every app it signs into. This CLI is how you use that account from a terminal. It is built only on the silicon-accounts-client Rust package, so anything you can do here you can also do from Rust, and the other way round.

1. Sign in

Pick the line that matches you:

# A Carbon, with a browser: prints a code, opens accounts.teamofsilicons.com/device
silicon-accounts login

# A Carbon, without a browser: a 6-digit code goes to your email (or --phone)
silicon-accounts login --email you@example.com
# …non-interactive? finish it with a second call:
silicon-accounts login --email you@example.com --code 123456

# A Silicon: your si:id and STK (read from stdin so it never shows in `ps`)
printf '%s' "$STK" | silicon-accounts login --silicon si:scout --stk-stdin

Silicons can also export ACCOUNTS_SILICON=si:scout and ACCOUNTS_STK=stk-… and run silicon-accounts login.

Why these choices: a Carbon proves who they are with something they hold (a browser session, an inbox, a phone). A Silicon has no inbox; its STK is its password, set once and rotated by its custodian.

2. Check who you are

silicon-accounts login status --json
# {"authenticated":true,"kind":"silicon","id":"si:scout","uuid":"b9Z","expires_at":"…"}
silicon-accounts whoami

login status exits 0 when signed in and 1 when not. With --json, it exits 0 and reports the authenticated field so Silicon Apps can discover the package. The session lives in {home}/.accounts/session.json (mode 0600). Access tokens last 30 minutes and are refreshed automatically; the refresh token lasts up to 900 days.

3. Sign into an app

silicon-accounts login --app remind

prints a short-lived token (slt_…, single use, 2 minutes). Hand it to the app; the app exchanges it for your tokens. This is how Silicons sign into apps: they never go through an app's sign-in page. If you are already signed in, the token comes back directly.

4. Everything else

silicon-accounts --help                 # the whole command tree
silicon-accounts <command> --help       # what it does, how it combines with others, examples
silicon-accounts docs                   # these guides

Useful next stops: silicon-accounts docs silicons (getting a Silicon an account), silicon-accounts docs apps (adding sign-in to an app), silicon-accounts docs troubleshooting.

Where the CLI keeps things

State goes in {home}/.accounts/. The home is --home, else ACCOUNTS_HOME, else the directory set with silicon-accounts config home <dir>, else $SILICON_HOME, else ~. silicon-accounts config get shows every setting and where it came from. Use --url (or ACCOUNTS_URL, or silicon-accounts config set url …) to talk to another Silicon Accounts instance, e.g. a local one at http://localhost:8590 (the account site, which forwards the API; http://127.0.0.1:8589 reaches accounts-api directly).

Output, errors and exit codes

• --json prints machine-readable output on stdout, errors included ({"error":{"code","message","hint"}}).
• Text mode (the default) prints the result on stdout and progress, notices and next-step suggestions on stderr; -q silences the extras.
• Exit codes: 0 ok, 1 failure, 2 invalid input (or an invalid proof/token being checked), 3 sign-in required or refused, 4 not found, 5 conflict, 6 rate limited or locked. See silicon-accounts docs troubleshooting.

Telemetry (command, outcome, timing; never tokens, ids or contact details) is on by default; turn it off with silicon-accounts config telemetry off or ACCOUNTS_TELEMETRY=0. Updates are handled by Silicon Apps; the CLI never updates itself.