alphaXiv CLI command map

Command-family summary

Command family	Use it for	Auth required	Saved paper context	Mutates state
`search all	papers	topics	organizations`	Keyword-driven lookup of papers, topics, and organizations
`feed filters	list`	Discover topic slugs and rank recent papers from the homepage feed	No	No
`paper show	abstract	summary	overview	overview-status
`paper vote	view`	Record paper-level engagement	Yes	Yes
`paper comments add	reply	upvote	delete`	Authenticated comment actions on a paper thread
`paper folders list	add	remove`	Inspect or change which of your folders contain one paper	Yes
`assistant list	history	model	set-model	start
`folders list	show`	Inspect all authenticated folders and the papers inside them	Yes	No
`context show	use	clear`	Manage the locally saved current paper and assistant session	No
`auth set-api-key	login-web	status	clear	clear-web`

If the user wants...	Use this command	Why
Keyword matches for a phrase or idea	`alphaxiv search papers "<query>"`	`search` is keyword-driven, not feed-ranked
Recent or ranked papers on a topic	`alphaxiv feed filters search "<topic>"` then `alphaxiv feed list ...`	`feed` is the discovery surface for recent and ranked papers
The author-written abstract	`alphaxiv paper abstract <paper-id>`	`paper summary` and `paper overview` are AI-generated
A quick AI digest	`alphaxiv paper summary <paper-id>`	Shorter than `paper overview`, more synthetic than `paper abstract`
A longer generated explanation	`alphaxiv paper overview <paper-id>`	Use when the short summary is not enough
Readable paper body text	`alphaxiv paper text <paper-id>`	This is extracted text, not the original PDF file
The actual PDF file	`alphaxiv paper pdf download <paper-id> ./paper.pdf`	Use this when the output should be a saved file
A new assistant conversation	`alphaxiv assistant start "..."`	`assistant reply` continues an existing saved session; switch back to `start` if a long thread gets slow
Continue the current assistant chat	`alphaxiv assistant reply "..."`	Use after `assistant start` or `context use assistant ...`; it keeps growing the same remote session
Save a paper for repeated use	`alphaxiv context use paper <paper-id>`	Lets many later `paper` commands omit the id
Check which folders already contain a paper	`alphaxiv paper folders list <paper-id>`	`folders list` shows all folders, not one paper's membership

Prefer search, feed, and paper before assistant.
Use feed when importance, recency, or ranking matters; use search when keywords are already known.
Use paper text when the user asks for the full text or readable paper body.
Use paper pdf download when the user wants the file itself.
If a long assistant chat becomes slow, prefer a fresh assistant start with a concise recap over continuing the same session indefinitely.
Avoid mutating commands unless the user explicitly asks to change remote state.