Slash Commands

May 18, 2026 · View on GitHub

Inside the TUI, type / to open the command palette. Caveman Code ships 10 built-in commands and reads user-authored markdown commands from ~/.cave/commands/ and project-local .cave/commands/.

Built-in commands

Command	What it does
`/login` `/logout`	OAuth flow for any provider
`/model`	Switch model mid-session, transcript reformatted in place
`/provider`	List/switch active provider
`/settings`	Edit `~/.cave/settings.json` in your `$EDITOR`
`/new` `/resume` `/tree` `/fork`	Session lifecycle and branching
`/compact`	Manual context compaction (auto on overflow)
`/copy` `/export` `/share`	Copy transcript / export JSON / share link
`/plan` `/act`	Switch between plan and edit modes
`/tokens`	Live token / cost breakdown
`/repomap`	Show the current repo map (PageRank-ranked symbols)
`/architect`	Architect/editor split mode
`/checkpoint` `/rollback N`	Shadow-git snapshots
`/memory`	cavemem queries: `search`, `save`, `consolidate`, `sync`
`/help` `/hotkeys` `/changelog`	Self-explanatory

Default user commands shipped with Caveman Code

These ship in ~/.cave/commands/ after first run. You can edit or delete any of them.

Command	What it does
`/commit`	Stage changes, propose a conventional-commit message, commit
`/test`	Run the test suite, summarize failures
`/review`	Read the diff vs `main` and produce a code-review summary
`/explain`	Explain the file/symbol under cursor
`/fix-types`	Walk type errors and propose fixes
`/perf`	Profile the cwd app and suggest optimizations
`/sec-review`	Run a security audit pass on the diff
`/clean`	Delete dead imports, unused vars
`/log`	Append a session note to `CHANGELOG.md`
`/migrate`	Run a recipe from `.cave/recipes/`

Authoring a slash command

Create ~/.cave/commands/my-cmd.md:

---
description: "Run prettier on the staged files and re-stage"
argument-hint: "[--all]"
allowed-tools: [Bash, Edit]
model: claude-haiku-4
---

You are a code-formatter. Run prettier on every file in `$ARGUMENTS` (default
to staged files: `!`git diff --cached --name-only``). Re-stage the changes.

Frontmatter keys (full list — superset of Claude Code):

Key	Purpose
`description`	Auto-loaded into the command palette
`argument-hint`	Shown next to the command name
`arguments`	Typed arg schema (validated before run)
`allowed-tools`	Tool allowlist for this command
`disallowed-tools`	Tool denylist
`disable-model-invocation`	Hide from auto-suggestion
`user-invocable`	Default `true`
`model`	Override session model for this command
`effort`	`low`/`medium`/`high` thinking
`context: fork`	Fork into a sub-session
`agent`	Dispatch to a named subagent
`hooks`	Inline hook overrides
`paths`	Limit the command to certain glob paths
`shell`	Inline shell preprocessing language

Substitutions

$ARGUMENTS — full argv after the command
$0, $1, ... — positional args
${CAVE_SESSION_ID}, ${CAVE_SKILL_DIR}, ${CAVE_EFFORT} — session vars
!`cmd` — runs cmd at command-load time, substitutes stdout

Hot reload

Caveman Code watches ~/.cave/commands/ and .cave/commands/ for changes. Save the file, the new version is live on the next /.

Project vs user vs plugin scope

Scope	Path	When to use
Project	`.cave/commands/*.md`	Lives in repo; team shares it
User	`~/.cave/commands/*.md`	Personal preferences
Plugin	`node_modules/<plugin>/commands/*.md`	Installed via `caveman plugin install`

User overrides project overrides plugin. Conflicts surface in caveman doctor.

Importing from Claude Code

cp ~/.claude/commands/*.md ~/.cave/commands/

The frontmatter formats are identical. Paste-and-go.