rdf4j-cli

A command-line tool for managing Eclipse RDF4J repositories via the REST API.

Features

• Repository management -- create, list, delete, and inspect repositories
• SPARQL queries -- SELECT, ASK, CONSTRUCT, DESCRIBE with table, JSON, or CSV output
• SPARQL updates -- INSERT, DELETE, and other update operations
• Statement operations -- get, add, and delete RDF statements with pattern filters
• Namespace management -- list, get, set, delete, and clear namespace prefixes
• File upload -- upload RDF files (Turtle, N-Triples, N-Quads, RDF/XML, JSON-LD, TriG, N3) with automatic format detection
• Multiple output formats -- --format table (default), json, or csv

Crates

Crate	Description
rdf4j-cli	CLI for managing RDF4J repositories via the REST API
rdf4j-rs	Rust SDK for the RDF4J REST API

Installation

From crates.io

cargo install rdf4j-cli

From source

cargo install --path rdf4j-cli

Build from Git

git clone https://github.com/odysa/rdf4j-cli.git
cd rdf4j-cli
cargo build --release
# Binary at target/release/rdf4j-cli

Quick start

Start an RDF4J server (e.g. with Docker):

docker run -d -p 8080:8080 eclipse/rdf4j-workbench

Then:

# Create a repository
rdf4j-cli repo create --id my-repo --repo-type memory

# Insert data
rdf4j-cli update my-repo 'INSERT DATA {
  <http://example.org/alice> <http://example.org/name> "Alice" .
  <http://example.org/bob>   <http://example.org/name> "Bob" .
}'

# Query
rdf4j-cli query my-repo 'SELECT ?s ?name WHERE { ?s <http://example.org/name> ?name }'

# Output:
# ╭──────────────────────────────┬─────────╮
# │ s                            │ name    │
# ├──────────────────────────────┼─────────┤
# │ <http://example.org/alice>   │ "Alice" │
# │ <http://example.org/bob>     │ "Bob"   │
# ╰──────────────────────────────┴─────────╯

# Delete the repository
rdf4j-cli repo delete my-repo

Usage

Global options

--server <URL>    RDF4J server URL (or set RDF4J_SERVER env var)
                  [default: http://localhost:8080/rdf4j-server]
--format <FMT>    Output format: table, json, csv [default: table]

Server

rdf4j-cli server health       # Check if server is reachable
rdf4j-cli server protocol     # Get protocol version

Repositories

rdf4j-cli repo list                                    # List all repositories
rdf4j-cli repo create --id my-repo --repo-type memory  # Create (memory or native)
rdf4j-cli repo create --id my-repo --title "My Repo"   # With a title
rdf4j-cli repo size my-repo                            # Statement count
rdf4j-cli repo delete my-repo                          # Delete

SPARQL query

# Inline query
rdf4j-cli query my-repo 'SELECT * WHERE { ?s ?p ?o } LIMIT 10'

# From file
rdf4j-cli query my-repo --file query.rq

# JSON output
rdf4j-cli --format json query my-repo 'SELECT * WHERE { ?s ?p ?o }'

# Disable inference
rdf4j-cli query my-repo --no-infer 'SELECT * WHERE { ?s ?p ?o }'

SPARQL update

# Inline update
rdf4j-cli update my-repo 'INSERT DATA { <http://example.org/s> <http://example.org/p> "value" . }'

# From file
rdf4j-cli update my-repo --file update.ru

Namespaces

rdf4j-cli namespace my-repo list                                 # List all
rdf4j-cli namespace my-repo get ex                               # Get URI for prefix
rdf4j-cli namespace my-repo set ex http://example.org/           # Set prefix
rdf4j-cli namespace my-repo delete ex                            # Delete prefix
rdf4j-cli namespace my-repo clear                                # Clear all

Statements

# Get all statements
rdf4j-cli statement my-repo get

# Filter by subject
rdf4j-cli statement my-repo get --subj '<http://example.org/alice>'

# Add from file
rdf4j-cli statement my-repo add --file data.nt

# Delete by pattern
rdf4j-cli statement my-repo delete --subj '<http://example.org/alice>'

File upload

# Auto-detect format from extension
rdf4j-cli upload my-repo data.ttl

# Explicit format
rdf4j-cli upload my-repo data.txt --rdf-format ntriples

# Upload into a named graph
rdf4j-cli upload my-repo data.ttl --context http://example.org/graph

# With base URI
rdf4j-cli upload my-repo data.ttl --base-uri http://example.org/

Supported formats: Turtle (.ttl), N-Triples (.nt), N-Quads (.nq), RDF/XML (.rdf, .xml), JSON-LD (.jsonld), TriG (.trig), N3 (.n3).

Configuration

The server URL can be set three ways (in order of precedence):

1. --server flag
2. RDF4J_SERVER environment variable
3. Default: http://localhost:8080/rdf4j-server

# Using env var
export RDF4J_SERVER=http://my-server:8080/rdf4j-server
rdf4j-cli repo list

# Using flag
rdf4j-cli --server http://my-server:8080/rdf4j-server repo list

Development

Build

cargo build

Lint

cargo clippy --all-targets

Tests

Unit tests (no Docker required):

cargo test -- --skip test_health --skip test_protocol --skip test_create \
  --skip test_sparql --skip test_add --skip test_namespace --skip test_upload --skip test_e2e

Integration + e2e tests (requires Docker):

cargo test --test integration -- --test-threads=1

Or with an external RDF4J server:

RDF4J_TEST_URL=http://localhost:8080/rdf4j-server cargo test --test integration -- --test-threads=1

Examples

See the examples/ folder for runnable shell scripts:

• complete_workflow.sh -- Full lifecycle: create, insert, query (table/JSON/CSV), delete
• query_formats.sh -- Table, JSON, and CSV output side by side
• upload_file.sh -- Upload Turtle files and query with PREFIX
• statements.sh -- Add, filter, and delete statements
• namespaces.sh -- Namespace prefix management

Architecture

rdf4j-rs/             Library crate (Rust SDK)
  src/
    lib.rs            Public module exports
    client.rs         RDF4J HTTP client
    error.rs          Error types
    repo.rs           Repository configuration types

rdf4j-cli/            Binary crate (CLI)
  src/
    main.rs           Entry point
    lib.rs            Public module exports
    cli.rs            Clap command definitions
    output.rs         Table/JSON/CSV formatting
    commands/
      server.rs       health, protocol
      repo.rs         list, create, delete, size
      query.rs        SPARQL query
      update.rs       SPARQL update
      namespace.rs    namespace CRUD
      statement.rs    statement get/add/delete
      upload.rs       RDF file upload

Key dependencies

• clap -- CLI argument parsing
• reqwest -- HTTP client (blocking)
• oxrdf + oxrdfio -- RDF types and serialization
• sparesults -- SPARQL results parsing
• tabled -- Table output formatting

Related

• rdf4j-python -- Python client library for RDF4J (the reference implementation this CLI is based on)
• Eclipse RDF4J -- The RDF4J framework

License

MIT