Non-Interactive Mode

When you provide a prompt argument on the command line, term2 executes non-interactively without launching the terminal UI:

term2 [options] [prompt...]

Basic Non-Interactive Queries

Execute one-off queries with stdout output:

term2 "Explain the purpose of package.json in this project"

A positional prompt without --auto-approve uses builtin:lite by default (unless a persisted Mentor or Orchestrator profile takes precedence), so tools are unavailable. --auto-approve opts out of that implicit Lite selection and enables tools. It applies GREEN/YELLOW heuristic policy; it is not the same as /auto-approve always, and RED shell commands are still refused.

The output streams directly to standard output. Non-error diagnostic logs are printed to standard error.

Enabling Tool Execution (--auto-approve)

To permit the agent to run tools (such as reading files, writing changes, or executing commands), pass --auto-approve:

term2 --auto-approve "Run pnpm typecheck and fix any trivial lint errors"

Output Formatting & Scripting

Quiet Mode (-q, --quiet)

Suppress non-error diagnostics on stderr to cleanly capture tool output in shell variables:

TODO_LIST=$(term2 -q "List all TODO comments in source/")

JSON Mode (--json)

Emit newline-delimited JSON (NDJSON) events on standard output for machine consumption:

term2 --json "Find potential security issues in auth.ts"

The conversation event stream can emit these type values: approval_required, background_check_in_due, background_shell_completed, background_shell_output, background_shell_started, codex_rate_limits, command_message, context_compaction_completed, context_compaction_failed, context_compaction_started, cost_update, error, final, reasoning_delta, retry, retry_exhausted, run_budget, subagent_approval_required, subagent_command_message, subagent_completed, subagent_interrupted, subagent_question, subagent_run_budget, subagent_started, subagent_streaming_text, subagent_streaming_tool, subagent_text_turn, subagent_tool_started, subagent_transferred, text_delta, tool_call_streaming_delta, tool_dispatched, tool_recovery, tool_started, usage_update, and user_message_consumed_for_abort. Non-interactive JSON also emits approval_rejected for a refusal and completed after success.

Streaming Reasoning Deltas (--show-reasoning)

Stream thinking/reasoning deltas from reasoning-capable models (e.g. o1, o3, Grok, Claude with thinking) to standard error:

term2 --show-reasoning "Solve this mathematical recurrence relation"

Lightweight Non-Interactive Execution (--lite)

Run in lite mode without indexing the workspace codebase, ideal for quick terminal calculations, log analysis, or system commands:

term2 --lite "Show the top 5 largest directories under /var/log"