Interactive CLI applications

Some cmds are interactive — REPLs, TUIs, vim, kubectl exec -it, psql. They need direct access to your terminal: a real TTY, no buffering, no log-prefixing. Mark those tasks interactive: true.

Basics

version: '3'

tasks:
  shell:
    interactive: true
    cmds:
      - psql $DATABASE_URL

Without interactive: true, rite wraps the cmd's output to add the [shell] prefix and capture stdout/stderr for its own log streams. That wrapping interferes with anything that paints the screen with escape codes or expects an unbuffered tty.

What it changes

interactive: true switches the task's output handling to interleaved mode:

• No [task-name] prefix on output — the cmd writes directly to your terminal.
• No buffering — output flows through the moment the cmd produces it.
• Stdin works — the cmd can read from your keyboard, not from a pipe rite's holding open.

It does not allocate a pseudo-tty if there isn't one. If you run rite under a CI system that doesn't give it a tty, an interactive: true task still won't have one — that's a property of the parent environment, not something rite can manufacture.

When to reach for it

Want	Set
vim, nano, emacs	interactive: true
kubectl exec -it, docker run -it	interactive: true
psql, mysql, redis-cli	interactive: true
TUI dashboards (k9s, lazygit, btop)	interactive: true
Anything that paints with ANSI escape codes	interactive: true
Plain logging cmds	leave the default — you want the prefix

Mixing with non-interactive cmds

A task can have both kinds:

tasks:
  debug-pod:
    interactive: true
    cmds:
      - kubectl get pods -n prod      # output gets no prefix in interactive mode
      - kubectl exec -it $(kubectl get pods -n prod -l app=api -o name | head -1) -- /bin/bash

interactive: true is a task-level setting, not per-cmd. Either the whole task gets the interactive treatment or none of it does. If you want the prefix back for some cmds, split them into a separate task and chain via cmds: - task: foo.

Concurrency caveat

Two interactive: true tasks running concurrently fight for the same terminal — output gets intermixed, and only one of them can read stdin. Don't put interactive tasks in deps: of a parent that runs them in parallel. Use sequential cmds: chaining instead.