contract-cli

Beautiful contracts from the CLI — NDA, NCNDA, consulting, MSA, SOW, service, loan. Plain English, 1–3 pages, agent-friendly.

A stateful, single-binary CLI for drafting and rendering business contracts. Built for humans who want a clean terminal workflow and for AI agents that need a deterministic JSON interface to draft and dispatch contracts on their owner's behalf.

Sibling of invoice-cli — same SQLite store, same issuers, same clients. Drop a contract draft for a client you already invoice, in one binary.

Features

• Seven contract kinds, plain English. NDA (mutual or unilateral), NCNDA (non-circumvention — protects introductions from being cut out), consulting, MSA, SOW, service, loan. Embedded clause packs use real-contract conventions: kind as title, project as subtitle, "Dated" line, numbered (1)/(2) parties prose, "AGREED TERMS" section, discrete boilerplate (notices, counterparts & e-signatures, third-party rights, no-partnership, entire agreement).
• Describe what you need — get the right kind. contract kinds find "stop them going around me to steal my contact" → ncnda. Deterministic local scoring over per-kind trigger tags; ranked candidates, you pick. No LLM, no network, no guessing.
• Seven Typst templates, described and findable. contract template list shows each template's description, mood, tags, and fonts; contract template find "magazine masthead" ranks them. The lineup:
  • helvetica-nera — sober Swiss corporate instrument (default)
  • vienna-legal — warm boutique, cream + terracotta
  • editorial — formal serif, reads like a deed
  • gazette — magazine masthead: Fraunces black over a broadsheet dateline, literary Newsreader body
  • marrakech — the Iowan / cream / terracotta data-room voice
  • basel — Swiss brutalist grid with a marginalia rail
  • chancery — engraved deed: letterspaced Garamond capitals, true small caps, witness-ready execution
• Premium fonts ship in the binary. OFL faces (Fraunces, Newsreader, Literata, Libre Franklin, Archivo, EB Garamond, Cormorant Garamond) are embedded and passed to Typst via --font-path, so renders are identical on any machine. System faces (Iowan Old Style, Helvetica Neue) sit first in the stacks with embedded fallbacks.
• Composable clause packs. Include or exclude clauses at creation time (--include non_circumvention --exclude warranties), override any clause body from Markdown, add fully custom clauses. Arbitrary terms flow into pack {{vars}} via --term key=value — e.g. --term principal_text='£10,000 (ten thousand pounds sterling)'.
• Signature lifecycle with teeth. draft → sent → signed → active → expired / terminated. Executed contracts only move forward; sign refuses to overwrite a recorded signature without --force; drafts render with a DRAFT watermark (--final for the signing copy); sent/signed contracts lock clauses and metadata.
• Agent-native, conformance-tested. Full agent-cli-framework compliance, verified in CI by the framework's conformance script: canonical agent-info manifest with per-command arg/option schemas, JSON envelope on every code path (piped --help included), semantic exit codes 0–4, tested error suggestions, distribution-aware update, skill install|status for Claude / Codex / Gemini.

Install

Homebrew (macOS / Linux)

brew tap paperfoot/tap
brew install contract

Cargo

cargo install contract-cli

All install paths produce a single contract binary. Typst is the only runtime dependency (brew install typst).

Quick start

contract issuer list                                # shared with invoice-cli
contract clients list

# Don't remember the kind or template names? Describe them:
contract kinds find "they can't bypass me and deal direct"
contract template find "warm cream editorial"

# Quick mutual NDA — 3-year term
contract new --kind nda --as boris --client reshape-clinic \
    --purpose "exploring a joint product line" --term-years 3

# Non-circumvention agreement protecting an introduction
contract new --kind ncnda --as boris --client partner \
    --purpose "introduction to prospective lenders in connection with the transaction" \
    --term-years 2 --governing-law "England and Wales"

# Interest-free loan, fixed repayment date
contract new --kind loan --as boris --client friend \
    --term principal_text='£10,000 (ten thousand pounds sterling)' \
    --term interest_text='interest-free' \
    --term repayment_date=2026-12-01

# Render — DRAFT watermark by default; --final removes it
contract render NDA-boris-2026-0001 --template marrakech --final --open

# Record signatures — status auto-bumps to "signed" when both sides sign
contract sign NDA-boris-2026-0001 --side us   --name "B. Djordjevic" --title "Director"
contract sign NDA-boris-2026-0001 --side them --name "A. Pertusa"

Core commands

Command	Purpose
issuer add|edit|list|show|delete	Manage issuers (your side; shared with invoice-cli)
clients add|edit|list|show|delete	Manage counterparties (shared with invoice-cli)
new --kind <k> --as <i> --client <c> [options…]	Create a contract (--term key=value for kind-specific terms)
list | show | edit | duplicate | delete	Work the contract book (all top-level)
render <number> [--template] [--out] [--open] [--final | --draft]	Generate the PDF
mark <number> <status>	Lifecycle moves (forward-only once executed)
sign <number> --side us|them --name "…"	Record a signature (--force to overwrite)
contracts clauses list|add|edit|remove|move|reset	Compose the clause set
pack list | show <kind>	Browse clause packs
template list | find "<look>" | preview <name>	Discover and preview templates
kinds list | find "<need>"	Discover contract kinds
doctor	Verify typst + DB + packs + shared issuers/clients
agent-info	Canonical JSON capability manifest
skill install | status	Manage the embedded agent skill
update [--check]	Distribution-aware update (brew / cargo)

Run contract --help for Tips and Examples.

Template resolution

--template flag  >  contract.default_template  >  "helvetica-nera"

Templates are validated when set, not just at render. Every template carries a //! metadata header (description, mood, tags, fonts, paper) — drop your own .typ in the extracted templates dir with the same header and it participates in template list / template find immediately.

Composing clauses

contract pack show ncnda
contract contracts clauses add NCNDA-boris-2026-0001 non_solicit --position 8
contract contracts clauses edit NCNDA-boris-2026-0001 termination --from-file ./ours.md
contract contracts clauses reset NCNDA-boris-2026-0001

Clause bodies use simple Markdown — paragraphs, dash bullets, 1. numbered lists. Pack clauses substitute {{vars}}: the built-ins ({{our_legal_name}}, {{effective_date}}, {{term_text}}, {{governing_law}}, {{jurisdiction_phrase}}, {{fee_text}}, {{deliverables_block}}, {{purpose}}, …) plus any scalar you set via --term key=value.

State & privacy

• Config: ~/Library/Application Support/com.paperfoot.accounting/config.toml (macOS), env overrides via PAPERFOOT_*.
• Database: shared SQLite accounting.db in the same dir.
• Templates & fonts: extracted to the shared assets dir on first use; refreshed on upgrade.

Nothing ever leaves your machine. No telemetry. No phone-home.

Architecture

• Rust single binary; SQLite via rusqlite + refinery migrations (shared finance-core).
• Typst renders the PDF — templates + OFL fonts embedded via rust-embed, JSON sidecar pattern, typst compile --font-path.
• Clause packs as TOML, embedded. Seven kinds × standard pack.
• Follows agent-cli-framework; the conformance script runs in CI.

Scope

A contract drafting tool, not legal advice. Out of scope for now: negotiation/redline workflow, e-signature platforms, contracts with more than two parties (multi-party NCNDA/JV support is planned — the data model groundwork exists), M&A/court/regulatory documents. Have a lawyer review anything material.

License

MIT © 199 Biotechnologies