notebrain-cli

NoteBrain CLI is a Go-based command-line tool that converts an Obsidian vault or any folder of Markdown files into a queryable knowledge backend. The core workflow: the CLI indexes notes into a local ChromaDB vector database, then exposes three retrieval modes — semantic search, wikilink graph traversal, and hidden-connection discovery — all returning structured output that can be piped directly into another process or consumed by an LLM tool-use call.

The differentiating feature is the combination of vector similarity and graph traversal in a single local tool. Most local RAG setups stop at embedding similarity; NoteBrain adds wikilink-aware graph walking, so a query can surface notes that are semantically adjacent and notes that are structurally connected through your own links — two different signals that often return different results. The vendor states this is specifically designed so autonomous coding agents can query the vault as a structured tool, not just a text dump.

The tool fits tightly into offline or air-gapped developer workflows: a coding agent that needs domain context, a local LLM that needs a knowledge grounding layer, or an Obsidian power user who wants CLI-level search without leaving the terminal. It breaks down when you need a persistent HTTP API (there is none — the CLI is the interface), when multiple processes need concurrent access, or when the vault grows to a scale where local ChromaDB performance degrades and a rebuild cycle becomes disruptive. Teams that hit that ceiling move to a hosted or self-managed vector database with a proper ingestion pipeline.

The repository ships with an AI agent skill definition and documented integration with OpenCode, confirming the tool is explicitly designed to sit inside an agent’s tool-use chain rather than as a standalone search UI. It is MIT-licensed and self-hosted by definition — there is no hosted option and no server component.