Hackpost CLI

A local-first workspace for discovering AI bounties, evaluating project fit, preparing truthful application materials, and recording proof of work.

Fork acknowledgement

Hackpost CLI is a modified fork of Mads Lorentzen's AI Job Search, created by Mads Lorentzen.

The upstream project supplied the foundation for candidate profiles, job-fit evaluation, the drafter-reviewer pipeline, LaTeX CV and cover-letter generation, interview preparation, outcome tracking, ranking, portal adapters, security guards, tests, and the original Claude Code workflow structure.

The original copyright and MIT license are preserved in LICENSE, the upstream Git history remains intact, and detailed credit appears in ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS.md and NOTICE. Hackpost is independently maintained by xAGI Labs and is not endorsed by or affiliated with Mads Lorentzen, the upstream contributors, Anthropic, or Claude.

If you need the original employment-focused framework, use and star the upstream repository.

What Hackpost changes

Hackpost does not present the inherited work as original. It adds a separate AI-bounty product layer:

Hackpost addition	Difference from upstream
hackpost gigs and hackpost bounty	Queries Hackpost's normalized AI-bounty API instead of relying only on job-portal skills
hackpost apply HP-…	Resolves a bounty, records application intent locally, and hands it to /hackpost-apply
/hackpost-apply	Evaluates project-delivery fit and drafts a capability brief and application note instead of assuming a conventional employment cover letter
hackpost save, stats, and profile	Maintains a local bounty pipeline separate from the inherited employment tracker
hackpost ship	Records shipped work and optional token totals locally for proof-of-work experiments
hackpost privacy	Shows the collection boundary and confirms that v0.2 uploads nothing
hackpost leaderboard	Connects to Hackpost's opt-in activity leaderboard; token spend is explicitly not treated as ability
hackpost doctor	Checks Node, Claude Code, LaTeX, and optional PDF tooling
Live API plus offline snapshot	Uses hackpost.io/api when available and fictional bundled bounties when offline

The inherited workflows remain available because they are useful building blocks. Their source and authorship are identified in the repository history and acknowledgement files.

Install

Requirements for the Hackpost command:

• Node.js 20+
• Optional: Claude Code for the full application workflow
• Optional: LuaLaTeX and XeLaTeX for compiled application documents

git clone https://github.com/xAGI-labs/hackpost-cli.git
cd hackpost-cli
npm link
hackpost doctor

The inherited portal tools may additionally require Bun. See the upstream setup guide for the original framework's full dependencies.

Find AI bounties

# Browse the live Hackpost feed
hackpost gigs

# Filter by skill and budget
hackpost gigs --skill agents --min-budget 2000

# Inspect one listing
hackpost bounty hp-1048

# Save it locally
hackpost save hp-1048

The default API is https://hackpost.io/api. Override it when developing:

HACKPOST_API_URL=http://localhost:8788/api hackpost gigs

If the API cannot be reached, the CLI says that it is using the bundled fictional offline snapshot.

Prepare a bounty application

hackpost apply hp-1048

This records an application target in a gitignored local JSON file. It does not apply or send a message.

For the full workflow:

claude
/hackpost-apply HP-1048

The Hackpost workflow:

1. Retrieves the normalized brief and canonical source.
2. Evaluates delivery fit, availability, scope risk, and relevant shipped work.
3. Identifies gaps without inventing experience.
4. Drafts a concise application note and one-page capability brief.
5. Reviews the artifacts against the source requirements.
6. Stops before external submission and shows exactly what would be shared.

Record proof of work

hackpost ship \
  --title "Browser agent evaluation harness" \
  --url https://github.com/you/eval-harness \
  --tokens 250000

hackpost profile
hackpost leaderboard

Ships and token totals remain local in v0.2. The public leaderboard is currently a synthetic Season 00 demonstration. Future participation must be opt-in and inspectable before upload. Token consumption measures activity, task size, and model choice—not engineering ability.

Privacy boundary

hackpost privacy

Hackpost CLI v0.2 never uploads:

• prompts or conversations
• source code or private files
• API keys or credentials
• raw model responses

The following are local JSON records under job_scraper/ and ignored by git:

• saved bounty IDs
• application targets and status
• shipped-project records
• optional aggregate token totals

Nothing is submitted to a bounty source automatically.

Commands

Discovery
  hackpost gigs [--skill agents] [--min-budget 2000]
  hackpost bounty hp-1042
  hackpost save hp-1042

Application workflow
  hackpost apply hp-1042 [--url <hackpost-url>]
  hackpost stats
  hackpost profile

Proof of work
  hackpost ship --title "What you shipped" [--url <public-url>] [--tokens 250000]
  hackpost leaderboard

Trust
  hackpost privacy
  hackpost doctor

Inherited upstream workflows

Hackpost retains these upstream Claude Code workflows:

• /setup
• /scrape
• /apply
• /rank
• /interview
• /outcome
• /expand
• /upskill
• /add-template
• /add-portal
• /reset

Their design and implementation come from AI Job Search. Consult the upstream README for authoritative documentation and consider supporting its author.

Development

npm test
npm run lint:hackpost
python3 tools/security_guards.py
python3 -m unittest discover -s tests

The repository deliberately preserves upstream tests and security guards. Hackpost-specific CLI tests live in tests/hackpost-cli.test.mjs.

License

MIT. See LICENSE, NOTICE, and ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS.md.