icp-cli

A command-line tool for building and deploying applications on the Internet Computer.

Quick Start

# Install via Homebrew (macOS)
brew install dfinity/tap/icp-cli

# Create and deploy a project
icp new my-project && cd my-project
icp network start -d
icp deploy

# Show the status of your canisters
icp canister status

# Call a function on your canister
# icp canister call <canister-name> greet '("World")'
# The ones generated from the templates are typically called `backend`

icp canister call backend greet '("World")'

See the Installation Guide for all installation methods.

For dfx Users

If you're coming from dfx (the previous Internet Computer SDK), see the Migration Guide for command mappings, workflow differences, and how to migrate existing projects.

Documentation

📚 Full Documentation Site — Complete guides, tutorials, and reference

Or browse the markdown docs directly:

• Tutorial — Deploy your first canister
• Guides — How to accomplish common tasks
• Concepts — Understand how icp-cli works
• Reference — Complete CLI and configuration reference

Examples

The examples/ directory contains example projects to help you get started:

• icp-motoko/ — Motoko canister
• icp-rust/ — Rust canister
• icp-static-assets/ — Static website
• icp-environments/ — Multi-environment setup

View all examples →

Prerequisites

Language-specific toolchains (install for the languages you'll use):

• Rust canisters — Rust and rustup target add wasm32-unknown-unknown
• Motoko canisters — mops and mops toolchain init

Other dependencies:

• Docker — always required on Windows (with WSL2), and some projects may require it on other platforms.

Getting Help

• Documentation — Guides, concepts, and reference
• GitHub Issues — Bug reports and feature requests
• Developer Forum — Questions and discussions
• Discord — Real-time community chat in #dx-feedback

Contributing

Contributions are welcome! See CONTRIBUTING.md for detailed guidelines.

Development Quick Start

Prerequisites

• Rust 1.88.0+ (rustup.rs)
• Platform dependencies:

Platform	Install
macOS	xcode-select --install
Ubuntu/Debian	sudo apt install build-essential pkg-config libssl-dev
Fedora/RHEL	sudo dnf install gcc pkg-config openssl-devel
Arch Linux	sudo pacman -S base-devel openssl
Windows	VS build tools (see Rustup's guide)

Build and Test

git clone https://github.com/dfinity/icp-cli.git
cd icp-cli
cargo build
cargo test

Development

# Run the CLI during development
cargo run -- <command>

# Build release binary
cargo build --release
# Binary is at target/release/icp

# Format and lint
cargo fmt && cargo clippy

# Generate CLI docs (after changing commands)
./scripts/generate-cli-docs.sh

# Update config schemas (after changing manifest types)
./scripts/generate-config-schemas.sh

Working with Documentation

# Preview documentation site locally
cd docs-site && npm install && npm run dev
# Opens at http://localhost:4321

# Prepare docs for build (runs automatically during build)
./scripts/prepare-docs.sh

Documentation structure follows the Diátaxis framework:

• docs/guides/ - Task-oriented how-to guides
• docs/concepts/ - Understanding-oriented explanations
• docs/reference/ - Information-oriented specifications
• docs/migration/ - Migration guides

See docs/README.md for documentation writing guidelines.

License

Apache-2.0