- name
- workflowy
- description
- Workflowy outliner CLI for reading, searching, and editing nodes. Use when the user wants to interact with their Workflowy outline — searching, adding items, viewing trees, marking complete, bulk operations, or usage reports. Also use whenever the user shares a workflowy.com URL (e.g. https://workflowy.com/#/...).
- metadata
- openclaw
- emoji
- 📝
- homepage
- https://github.com/mholzen/workflowy
- requires
- bins
- [workflowy]
- config
- [~/.workflowy/api.key]
- install
- formula
- mholzen/workflowy/workflowy-cli
- bins
- [workflowy]
- primaryEnv
- WORKFLOWY_API_KEY
workflowy
Use the unofficial workflowy CLI mholzen/workflowy to interact with the Workflowy API for managing a Workflowy outline. Requires API key setup.
Setup (once)
Get your API key at https://workflowy.com/api-key/, save it to ~/.workflowy/api.key, and ensure only your user can access it:
mkdir -p ~/.workflowy
echo "your-api-key-here" > ~/.workflowy/api.key
chmod 600 ~/.workflowy/api.keyAlternatively, set the WORKFLOWY_API_KEY environment variable:
export WORKFLOWY_API_KEY="your-api-key-here"Common commands
Note: See the full command reference for more details.
Reading
# Get root nodes (depth 2 by default)
workflowy get
# Get specific node by UUID or short ID
workflowy get <item-id>
workflowy get https://workflowy.com/#/59fc7acbc68c
# Show a node's children as a flat list
workflowy list <item-id>
# Search (full text, case-insensitive)
workflowy search -i "meeting notes"
# Search with extended regex
workflowy search -E "<time.*>"
# Search within a subtree
workflowy search "bug" --item-id <parent-id>Writing
# Add a new node to the Inbox
workflowy create "Buy groceries" --parent-id=inbox
# Add a node to a specific parent
workflowy create "Task" --parent-id=<uuid>
# Update a node
workflowy update <item-id> --name "New name"
# Complete/uncomplete
workflowy complete <item-id>
workflowy uncomplete <item-id>
# Move a node
workflowy move <item-id> <new-parent-id>
# Delete a node (includes its children!)
workflowy delete <item-id>Bulk operations
# Search and replace (dry run first!)
workflowy replace --dry-run "foo" "bar"
workflowy replace --interactive "foo" "bar"
# Regex find/replace using capture groups
workflowy replace "TASK-([0-9]+)" 'ISSUE-$1'
# Transform: split by newlines into children
workflowy transform <item-id> split -s "\
"
# Transform: trim whitespace
workflowy transform <item-id> trimStatistics
# Where is most content?
workflowy report count --threshold 0.01
# Nodes with most children
workflowy report children --top-n 20
# Stale content (oldest modified)
workflowy report modified --top-n 50
# Most mirrored nodes (requires backup)
workflowy report mirrors --top-n 20Data Access Methods
| Method | Speed | Freshness | Use For |
|---|---|---|---|
--method=get | Medium | Real-time | Specific items |
--method=export | Fast (cached) | ~1 min | Full tree access |
--method=backup | Fastest | Stale | Bulk ops, offline |
For offline mode, enable Workflowy's Dropbox backup:
workflowy get --method=backupShort IDs
Workflowy supports short IDs, obtained from the "Copy Internal Link" menu:
- Web URL:
https://workflowy.com/#/59fc7acbc68c - Can be used directly, e.g.
workflowy get https://workflowy.com/#/59fc7acbc68c
Special named targets
inbox— user's inboxhome— root of outline
workflowy create "Quick note" --parent-id=inbox
workflowy id inbox # resolve to UUIDNotes
- Deleting a node also deletes all its children
- Results are sorted by priority (display order)
- Use
--method=exportfor large tree operations (cached, faster) - Mirror analysis requires using the backup method
- Make sure to confirm before performing bulk replace operations