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name: system-tools description: CLI toolkit for infrastructure, development, and system administration. Use when Claude needs to execute git operations or GitHub CLI commands, provision AWS/GCP/Azure/DigitalOcean infrastructure, build or debug Docker containers and Kubernetes clusters, connect via SSH or transfer files, query PostgreSQL/MySQL/Redis databases, process JSON with jq or YAML with yq, write shell scripts with error handling, or debug connectivity and performance issues. license: MIT

System Tools & CLI Reference

Overview

This skill provides patterns and best practices for command-line infrastructure management, development workflows, and system administration.

Reference files (load when needed):

• references/cli-reference.md - Complete command reference for all tools
• references/advanced.md - Complex workflows, scripting patterns, automation
• references/troubleshooting.md - Error messages, debugging strategies

Helper scripts in scripts/:

• retry.sh - Retry commands with exponential backoff
• health-check.sh - Service health monitoring
• backup-postgres.sh - PostgreSQL backup with rotation

Quick Reference

Core Workflows

Git & GitHub

Copy# Clone and branch
git clone https://github.com/owner/repo.git && cd repo
git checkout -b feature/new-feature

# Stage, commit, push
git add -p                          # Interactive staging
git commit -m "type: description"
git push origin feature/new-feature

# Pull request workflow
gh pr create --fill
gh pr list
gh pr checkout 123
gh pr merge 123 --squash --delete-branch

Critical rules:

• Never force push to shared branches (main, develop)
• Use --force-with-lease instead of --force

Docker

Copy# Build and run
docker build -t myapp:v1 .
docker run -d --name web -p 8080:80 nginx
docker run -it --rm ubuntu:22.04 bash

# Inspect and debug
docker ps -a
docker logs -f container_name
docker exec -it container_name bash

# Cleanup
docker system prune -a --volumes

Critical rules:

• Use specific image tags, never latest in production
• Set resource limits in production

Kubernetes

Copy# Context
kubectl config get-contexts
kubectl config use-context my-cluster

# Resources
kubectl get pods -o wide
kubectl describe pod pod-name
kubectl logs -f pod-name

# Apply and scale
kubectl apply -f manifest.yaml
kubectl scale deployment nginx --replicas=3
kubectl rollout undo deployment nginx

# Debug
kubectl get events --sort-by='.lastTimestamp'
kubectl run debug --image=busybox -it --rm -- sh

SSH & File Transfer

Copy# Connect
ssh user@hostname
ssh -i ~/.ssh/mykey.pem user@hostname

# Port forwarding
ssh -L 8080:localhost:80 user@server   # Local forward
ssh -J jumphost user@target            # Jump through bastion

# File transfer (prefer rsync for large transfers)
rsync -avz --progress ./src/ user@host:/dst/
rsync -avz --delete ./src/ dst/        # Mirror

Database Queries

Copy# PostgreSQL
psql -h localhost -U postgres -d dbname
psql -c "SELECT * FROM users LIMIT 10" -d dbname
pg_dump -Fc dbname > backup.dump

# MySQL
mysql -h localhost -u root -p dbname

# Redis (never use KEYS * in production)
redis-cli
SCAN 0 MATCH "user:*" COUNT 100

Data Processing with jq

Copy# Extract and filter
jq '.users[].name' data.json
jq '.users[] | select(.age > 30)' data.json

# Transform
jq '{name: .full_name, email: .contact.email}' data.json
jq '.items | sort_by(.price) | reverse' data.json

# Raw output
jq -r '.name' data.json

Cloud CLIs

Copy# AWS
aws configure
aws s3 sync ./local s3://bucket/dir
aws ec2 describe-instances --query 'Reservations[].Instances[].{ID:InstanceId,State:State.Name}'

# GCP
gcloud auth login
gcloud config set project PROJECT_ID
gcloud compute instances list

# DigitalOcean
doctl auth init
doctl compute droplet list

Critical rules:

• Never commit credentials to version control
• Use IAM roles/service accounts over static credentials

Helper Scripts Usage

retry.sh - Exponential Backoff

Copy# Retry a flaky command up to 5 times
scripts/retry.sh 5 curl -f https://api.example.com/health

# With custom delays
scripts/retry.sh -d 2 -m 30 -v 3 docker pull nginx:latest

health-check.sh - Service Monitoring

Copy# Run default checks
scripts/health-check.sh

# From config file
scripts/health-check.sh checks.conf

# Config format:
# http:https://api.example.com/health:200
# tcp:localhost:5432
# process:nginx
# disk:/:80

backup-postgres.sh - Database Backup

Copy# Basic backup
scripts/backup-postgres.sh mydb /backups

# With options
scripts/backup-postgres.sh -h db.example.com -U admin -k 30 mydb /backups

Common Patterns

API Testing

Copycurl -X POST https://api.example.com/data \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN" \
  -d '{"key": "value"}' | jq '.'

Log Analysis

Copy# Find errors with context
grep -E "error|exception" app.log | tail -50

# Count by type
grep -oE "Error: [^:]*" app.log | sort | uniq -c | sort -rn

Quick Backup

Copy# PostgreSQL
pg_dump -Fc dbname > backup_$(date +%Y%m%d).dump

# Sync to remote
rsync -avz /data/ backup-server:/backups/

When to Load References

Load references/cli-reference.md when:

• Need complete command options for a specific tool
• Looking up less common flags or features
• Working with tools not covered in quick reference

Load references/advanced.md when:

• Writing shell scripts with error handling
• Setting up CI/CD pipelines
• Implementing infrastructure as code
• Working with multi-cloud environments
• Need security hardening patterns

Load references/troubleshooting.md when:

• Encountering error messages
• Debugging connectivity issues
• Diagnosing performance problems
• Container or Kubernetes pods not starting

Dependencies

Core tools typically pre-installed: git, ssh, curl, grep, awk

Install via apt:

Copyapt install jq postgresql-client mysql-client redis-tools docker.io htop

Cloud CLIs:

Copy# AWS
curl "https://awscli.amazonaws.com/awscli-exe-linux-x86_64.zip" -o "awscliv2.zip"
unzip awscliv2.zip && sudo ./aws/install

# GitHub CLI
apt install gh