Admin By Request — Printing Press CLI
Prerequisites: Install the CLI
This skill drives the adminbyrequest-pp-cli binary. You must verify the CLI is installed before invoking any command from this skill. If it is missing, install it first:
- Install via the Printing Press installer. It defaults binaries to
$HOME/.local/binon macOS/Linux and%LOCALAPPDATA%\Programs\PrintingPress\binon Windows:npx -y @mvanhorn/printing-press-library install adminbyrequest --cli-only - Verify:
adminbyrequest-pp-cli --version - Ensure the reported install directory is on
$PATHfor the agent/runtime that will invoke this skill.
If the npx install fails (no Node, offline, etc.), fall back to a direct Go install (requires Go 1.26.6 or newer):
go install github.com/mvanhorn/printing-press-library/library/devices/adminbyrequest/cmd/adminbyrequest-pp-cli@latest
If --version reports "command not found" after install, the runtime cannot see the binary directory on $PATH. Do not proceed with skill commands until verification succeeds.
When to Use This CLI
Use this CLI when you are administering an Admin By Request tenant from a terminal or AI agent: triaging pending requests in bulk, pulling audit data into a SIEM you have not yet wired up, generating offline PINs without opening the portal, or answering cross-resource questions (repeat requestors, agent-version drift) that the portal does not directly support.
Unique Capabilities
These capabilities aren't available in any other tool for this API.
Local state that compounds
requests repeat-offenders— Surface the top users by elevation-request count over a configurable window, so admins can spot patterns the portal does not visualize.When tracing repeated elevation attempts across a fleet, this is the single query that names the people; without it, an agent has to walk every request and aggregate manually.
adminbyrequest-pp-cli requests repeat-offenders --window 30d --jsoncorrelate— Given an audit log entry ID, join it to nearby events on the same computer to reconstruct a full elevation timeline.Incident response often asks what else happened on this machine when this admin session opened; this is the single command that answers it.
adminbyrequest-pp-cli correlate 50461167 --window 5m --json
Fleet hygiene
inventory drift— List endpoints whose AbR client version is older than a target version, useful for upgrade campaigns.Before any compliance audit, the agent should know which endpoints are running an old client; this is the one-liner.
adminbyrequest-pp-cli inventory drift --client-version 8.7.2 --jsoninventory risk-score— Score each endpoint by elevation frequency, local-admin count, and AbR client version recency.Lets an admin focus remediation effort on the endpoints most likely to be abused.
adminbyrequest-pp-cli inventory risk-score --top 10 --json
Reachability mitigation
quota forecast— Track local API call count against the 100k-per-day quota and predict whether the current pace will exceed it before midnight.Reachability mitigation: an agent that calls the API in a loop needs to know before it bricks the tenant for the day.
adminbyrequest-pp-cli quota forecast --json
Compliance and review
requests denied-reasons— Tokenize the free-text deniedReason field across all denied requests and emit a top-N word distribution.For compliance review and tone-of-policy checks, surfacing the actual words used is faster than reading each row.
adminbyrequest-pp-cli requests denied-reasons --top 20 --jsonreport compliance— Render audit entries for a user or computer over a window in a format suitable for auditors (CSV or markdown).Auditor evidence requests always want a single artifact; this generates it in one command.
adminbyrequest-pp-cli report compliance --since 2026-01-01 --user CHRISCOOMBES --format md
Command Reference
auditlog — Admin session and elevation audit log entries
adminbyrequest-pp-cli auditlog delta— Delta query for audit log changes (use timeNow/deltaTime ticks for resumable sync)adminbyrequest-pp-cli auditlog list— List audit log entries (admin sessions, app elevations, denied requests). Pagination is by id cursor.
events — Security and operational events emitted by AbR clients
adminbyrequest-pp-cli events— List events. Use code filter to narrow to specific event types.
inventory — Endpoint inventory: hardware, software, OS, AbR agent version
adminbyrequest-pp-cli inventory list— List inventoried endpoints. Use wantsoftware/wanthardware to expand.adminbyrequest-pp-cli inventory pin— Generate an offline elevation PIN code for a device. Pass --challenge for challenge-response mode.
requests — Pending, approved, and denied elevation requests
adminbyrequest-pp-cli requests approve— Approve a pending elevation request.adminbyrequest-pp-cli requests deny— Deny a pending elevation request.adminbyrequest-pp-cli requests list— List elevation requests filtered by status.
Hand-written commands
adminbyrequest-pp-cli correlate <auditlog-id>— Join an audit log entry to nearby events on the same computer (window in minutes)adminbyrequest-pp-cli report— Render compliance reports from synced dataadminbyrequest-pp-cli quota— Track local API call count vs AbR's 100k/day quota
Finding the right command
When you know what you want to do but not which command does it, ask the CLI directly:
adminbyrequest-pp-cli which "<capability in your own words>"
which resolves a natural-language capability query to the best matching command from this CLI's curated feature index. Exit code 0 means at least one match; exit code 2 means no confident match — fall back to --help or use a narrower query.
Recipes
Triage pending requests as JSON
adminbyrequest-pp-cli requests list --status pending --agent --select id,user.account,reason
Surface the pending elevation queue in agent-friendly JSON narrowed to the fields needed to decide. Approve or deny individual ids with requests approve <id> --reason ... or requests deny <id> --reason ....
Compliance evidence for one user
adminbyrequest-pp-cli report compliance --since 2026-01-01 --user CHRISCOOMBES --format md > evidence.md
Render every audit log entry for a user since a date into a markdown report.
Find every device on an old client
adminbyrequest-pp-cli inventory drift --client-version 8.7.2 --json --select name,abrClientVersion
Inventory drift filters the synced inventory snapshot for endpoints below the target client version.
Check today's API quota consumption
adminbyrequest-pp-cli quota show --agent
Local counter of API calls made today; the CLI tracks them in ~/.cache/adminbyrequest-pp-cli/http/ so this command itself never costs an API call.
Audit-to-event timeline narrowed via --select
adminbyrequest-pp-cli correlate 50461167 --window 5m --agent --select audit.application.name,audit.user.account,events.eventText,events.eventTime
Joins audit entry to nearby events on the same computer; --select narrows the deeply nested response so the agent does not parse the full payload.
Auth Setup
Set ADMINBYREQUEST_API_KEY in your environment. The CLI sends it via the apikey header. AbR enforces a 100,000-call daily quota per tenant; the CLI tracks calls locally and warns you before exhaustion via quota forecast.
Run adminbyrequest-pp-cli doctor to verify setup.
Agent Mode
Add --agent to any command. Expands to: --json --compact --no-input --no-color --yes.
Pipeable — JSON on stdout, errors on stderr
Filterable —
--selectkeeps a subset of fields. Dotted paths descend into nested structures; arrays traverse element-wise. Critical for keeping context small on verbose APIs:adminbyrequest-pp-cli auditlog list --agent --select id,name,statusPreviewable —
--dry-runshows the request without sendingOffline-friendly — sync/search commands can use the local SQLite store when available
Non-interactive — never prompts, every input is a flag
Explicit retries — use
--idempotentonly when an already-existing create should count as success
Response envelope
Commands that read from the local store or the API wrap output in a provenance envelope:
{
"meta": {"source": "live" | "local", "synced_at": "...", "reason": "..."},
"results": <data>
}
Parse .results for data and .meta.source to know whether it's live or local. A human-readable N results (live) summary is printed to stderr only when stdout is a terminal — piped/agent consumers get pure JSON on stdout.
Agent Feedback
When you (or the agent) notice something off about this CLI, record it:
adminbyrequest-pp-cli feedback "the --since flag is inclusive but docs say exclusive"
adminbyrequest-pp-cli feedback --stdin < notes.txt
adminbyrequest-pp-cli feedback list --json --limit 10
Entries are stored locally at ~/.adminbyrequest-pp-cli/feedback.jsonl. They are never POSTed unless ADMINBYREQUEST_FEEDBACK_ENDPOINT is set AND either --send is passed or ADMINBYREQUEST_FEEDBACK_AUTO_SEND=true. Default behavior is local-only.
Write what surprised you, not a bug report. Short, specific, one line: that is the part that compounds.
Output Delivery
Every command accepts --deliver <sink>. The output goes to the named sink in addition to (or instead of) stdout, so agents can route command results without hand-piping. Three sinks are supported:
| Sink | Effect |
|---|---|
stdout |
Default; write to stdout only |
file:<path> |
Atomically write output to <path> (tmp + rename) |
webhook:<url> |
POST the output body to the URL (application/json or application/x-ndjson when --compact) |
Unknown schemes are refused with a structured error naming the supported set. Webhook failures return non-zero and log the URL + HTTP status on stderr.
Named Profiles
A profile is a saved set of flag values, reused across invocations. Use it when a scheduled agent calls the same command every run with the same configuration - HeyGen's "Beacon" pattern.
adminbyrequest-pp-cli profile save briefing --json
adminbyrequest-pp-cli --profile briefing auditlog list
adminbyrequest-pp-cli profile list --json
adminbyrequest-pp-cli profile show briefing
adminbyrequest-pp-cli profile delete briefing --yes
Explicit flags always win over profile values; profile values win over defaults. agent-context lists all available profiles under available_profiles so introspecting agents discover them at runtime.
Exit Codes
| Code | Meaning |
|---|---|
| 0 | Success |
| 2 | Usage error (wrong arguments) |
| 3 | Resource not found |
| 4 | Authentication required |
| 5 | API error (upstream issue) |
| 7 | Rate limited (wait and retry) |
| 10 | Config error |
Argument Parsing
Parse $ARGUMENTS:
- Empty,
help, or--help→ showadminbyrequest-pp-cli --helpoutput - Starts with
install→ ends withmcp→ MCP installation; otherwise → see Prerequisites above - Anything else → Direct Use (execute as CLI command with
--agent)
MCP Server Installation
Install the MCP binary from this CLI's published public-library entry or pre-built release, then register it:
claude mcp add adminbyrequest-pp-mcp -- adminbyrequest-pp-mcp
Verify: claude mcp list
Direct Use
- Check if installed:
which adminbyrequest-pp-cliIf not found, offer to install (see Prerequisites at the top of this skill). - Match the user query to the best command from the Unique Capabilities and Command Reference above.
- Execute with the
--agentflag:adminbyrequest-pp-cli <command> [subcommand] [args] --agent - If ambiguous, drill into subcommand help:
adminbyrequest-pp-cli <command> --help.