The TutsPlus.com site has posted a new tutorial introducing you to the WordPress command line tool, the WP-CLI.

WP-CLI has been around for quite some time now (circa 2011) and has steadily gained momentum in the WordPress developer community. But what is it exactly, and how can you use it in your WordPress workflow?

The idea behind WP-CLI is that it allows you to interact with, and manage, WordPress sites via a command line interface. According to the official documentation, it's a command line alternative to using the traditional WordPress admin user interface.

They starts by explaining some of what the tool can do and help you get it installed either manually (on Mac or Windows) or more automatically for the DesktopServer users out there. The tutorial then goes through the basics of using the wp command line tool including getting a listing of current settings, showing the version installed and getting a list of currently installed plugins and themes. It also shows how to install new plugins, list posts, pages and comments currently in the system. The post ends with some additional resources where you can get more information about the WP-CLI tool and its features.