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xitter

/home/avalon/.hermes/skills/social-media/xitter/SKILL.md · raw

Xitter — X/Twitter via x-cli

Use x-cli for official X/Twitter API interactions from the terminal.

This skill is for: - posting tweets, replies, and quote tweets - searching tweets and reading timelines - looking up users, followers, and following - liking and retweeting - checking mentions and bookmarks

This skill intentionally does not vendor a separate CLI implementation into Hermes. Install and use upstream x-cli instead.

Important Cost / Access Note

X API access is not meaningfully free for most real usage. Expect to need paid or prepaid X developer access. If commands fail with permissions or quota errors, check your X developer plan first.

Install

Install upstream x-cli with uv:

uv tool install git+https://github.com/Infatoshi/x-cli.git

Upgrade later with:

uv tool upgrade x-cli

Verify:

x-cli --help

Credentials

You need these five values from the X Developer Portal: - X_API_KEY - X_API_SECRET - X_BEARER_TOKEN - X_ACCESS_TOKEN - X_ACCESS_TOKEN_SECRET

Get them from: - https://developer.x.com/en/portal/dashboard

Why does X need 5 secrets?

Unfortunately, the official X API splits auth across both app-level and user-level credentials:

So yes — it is a lot of secrets for one integration, but this is the stable official API path and is still preferable to cookie/session scraping.

Setup requirements in the portal: 1. Create or open your app 2. In user authentication settings, set permissions to Read and write 3. Generate or regenerate the access token + access token secret after enabling write permissions 4. Save all five values carefully — missing any one of them will usually produce confusing auth or permission errors

Note: upstream x-cli expects the full credential set to be present, so even if you mostly care about read-only commands, it is simplest to configure all five.

Cost / Friction Reality Check

If this setup feels heavier than it should be, that is because it is. X’s official developer flow is high-friction and often paid. This skill chooses the official API path because it is more stable and maintainable than browser-cookie/session approaches.

If the user wants the least brittle long-term setup, use this skill. If they want a zero-setup or unofficial path, that is a different trade-off and not what this skill is for.

Where to Store Credentials

x-cli looks for credentials in ~/.config/x-cli/.env.

If you already keep your X credentials in ~/.hermes/.env, the cleanest setup is:

mkdir -p ~/.config/x-cli
ln -sf ~/.hermes/.env ~/.config/x-cli/.env

Or create a dedicated file:

mkdir -p ~/.config/x-cli
cat > ~/.config/x-cli/.env <<'EOF'
X_API_KEY=your_consumer_key
X_API_SECRET=your_secret_key
X_BEARER_TOKEN=your_bearer_token
X_ACCESS_TOKEN=your_access_token
X_ACCESS_TOKEN_SECRET=your_access_token_secret
EOF
chmod 600 ~/.config/x-cli/.env

Quick Verification

x-cli user get openai
x-cli tweet search "from:NousResearch" --max 3
x-cli me mentions --max 5

If reads work but writes fail, regenerate the access token after confirming Read and write permissions.

Common Commands

Tweets

x-cli tweet post "hello world"
x-cli tweet get https://x.com/user/status/1234567890
x-cli tweet delete 1234567890
x-cli tweet reply 1234567890 "nice post"
x-cli tweet quote 1234567890 "worth reading"
x-cli tweet search "AI agents" --max 20
x-cli tweet metrics 1234567890

Users

x-cli user get openai
x-cli user timeline openai --max 10
x-cli user followers openai --max 50
x-cli user following openai --max 50

Self / Authenticated User

x-cli me mentions --max 20
x-cli me bookmarks --max 20
x-cli me bookmark 1234567890
x-cli me unbookmark 1234567890

Quick Actions

x-cli like 1234567890
x-cli retweet 1234567890

Output Modes

Use structured output when the agent needs to inspect fields programmatically:

x-cli -j tweet search "AI agents" --max 5
x-cli -p user get openai
x-cli -md tweet get 1234567890
x-cli -v -j tweet get 1234567890

Recommended defaults: - -j for machine-readable output - -v when you need timestamps, metrics, or metadata - plain/default mode for quick human inspection

Agent Workflow

  1. Confirm x-cli is installed
  2. Confirm credentials are present
  3. Start with a read command (user get, tweet search, me mentions)
  4. Use -j when extracting fields for later steps
  5. Only perform write actions after confirming the target tweet/user and the user's intent

Pitfalls

Notes