review-bench/cardstack_boxel/profile

Profiles

Wraps boxel profile, which manages credentials for different users and environments. Profiles live in ~/.boxel-cli/profiles.json (mode 0600).

When the user asks to...

Profile IDs

Profiles use the Matrix ID format: @username:domain.

• Production: @username:boxel.ai
• Staging: @username:stack.cards
• Local dev: @username:<env-slug>.localhost

switch accepts a partial match — boxel profile switch sarah is enough if there's only one profile matching sarah.

Adding profiles non-interactively

For automation, set BOXEL_PASSWORD in the environment instead of passing -p:

BOXEL_PASSWORD="..." boxel profile add -u @sarah:boxel.ai -n "Sarah - Prod"

-p works but exposes the password in shell history and process listings. Prefer BOXEL_PASSWORD.

Custom matrix / realm-server URLs

For ephemeral environments (PR previews, branch deploys), BOXEL_ENVIRONMENT derives URLs from a slug:

BOXEL_ENVIRONMENT=my-branch boxel profile add -u @sarah:my-branch.localhost
# → matrix at http://matrix.my-branch.localhost
# → realm-server at http://realm-server.my-branch.localhost/

Override individually with --matrix-url / --realm-server-url if needed.

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Commands

_Generated from the boxel-cli Commander tree by_ pnpm build:plugin. _Edit prose outside the generated block — never inside it._

boxel profile [subcommand] [arg]

Manage saved profiles for different users/environments

Arguments:

• [subcommand] — list | add | switch | remove | migrate
• [arg] — Profile ID (for switch/remove)

Options:

• -u, --user <matrixId> — Matrix user ID (e.g., @user:boxel.ai)
• -p, --password <password> — Password (for add command)
• -n, --name <displayName> — Display name (for add command)
• -m, --matrix-url <url> — Matrix server URL (for add command with non-standard domains)
• -r, --realm-server-url <url> — Realm server URL (for add command with non-standard domains)

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Pitfalls

• A fresh machine has no profiles. boxel profile list returns empty until boxel profile add is run at least once.
• The active profile is per-shell — switching doesn't propagate to other open terminals automatically.
• migrate is a one-shot operation for users coming from the old .env storage. New users don't need it.