Posting is a terminal-based (TUI) HTTP client designed for efficient, keyboard-centric workflows. It functions similarly to Postman or Insomnia but is optimized for the terminal and can be used over SSH.

Key features include:

• Request Management: Requests are stored locally in simple YAML files, making them easy to version control.
• Navigation & UI: Supports 'jump mode' navigation, Vim keys, a command palette, and autocompletion.
• Advanced Workflows: Supports environments/variables, running Python code before/after requests, and customizable keybindings/themes.
• Interoperability: Import requests from cURL (by pasting into the URL bar), Postman, or OpenAPI specs; export requests as cURL commands.
• Editor Integration: Ability to open content in your configured $EDITOR or $PAGER.

Requests in Posting are stored directly on your file system as simple YAML files with the .posting.yaml suffix. This makes them easy to read, version control, and share.

To load requests into the application, use the --collection option to specify a directory. Posting will then display all .posting.yaml files found within that directory in the sidebar.

name: Create user
description: Adds a new user to the system.
method: POST
url: https://jsonplaceholder.typicode.com/users
body: 
  content: |- 
    {
      "firstName": "John",
      "email": "john.doe@example.com"
    }
headers:
- name: Content-Type
  value: application/json
params:
- name: sendWelcomeEmail
  value: 'true'

Posting allows you to attach Python scripts to requests at three distinct stages of the request/response lifecycle. Understanding these stages is key to knowing when you can modify data versus when you can only inspect it:

1. Setup Scripts: Executed before the request is constructed. Use these to initialize variables (via posting.set_variable) that will be substituted into the request using the $ syntax (e.g., $my_var).
2. Pre-request Scripts: Executed after the request is constructed and variables are substituted, but before the request is sent. Use these to directly manipulate the RequestModel object (e.g., adding headers or changing authentication).
3. Post-response Scripts: Executed after the response is received. Use these to inspect the httpx.Response object, extract data (like tokens), or perform cleanup tasks.

The collection browser is the sidebar in the Posting UI that displays the files within your currently open collection.

• Navigation: Use your mouse or keyboard to navigate the tree. Press Enter on a focused request to load it into the main UI.
• Selection: An open request is marked with a visual indicator to the left of its title.
• Saving: Performing a save operation will overwrite the currently open request in the collection.
• Shortcuts: Use Shift+j and Shift+k to jump through sub-collections. Press F1 while the browser has focus to see the full list of shortcuts.
• Positioning: You can move the sidebar to the left or right side of the screen by configuring collection_browser.position to either "left" or "right".

Posting loads configuration from three sources. If a setting is defined in multiple places, the source with the highest precedence wins. The order of precedence (from highest to lowest) is:

1. Configuration file (YAML)
2. Environment variables
3. .env files

You can use variables within Posting's input fields and text areas to dynamically substitute values into outgoing requests. Use either the ${VARIABLE_NAME} or $VARIABLE_NAME syntax. These variables must be defined in a loaded .env file or available in the host environment.

https://${ENV_NAME}.example.com

Posting supports dotenv files, which are useful for swapping settings between environments (e.g., dev vs prod).

To load a specific .env file, use the --env CLI option. You can supply this option multiple times to load multiple files.

Example .env file:

POSTING_THEME="cobalt"
POSTING_LAYOUT="vertical"
POSTING_HEADING__VISIBLE="false"

To run Posting with a specific environment file:

posting --env dev.env

# Example .env content
POSTING_THEME="cobalt"
POSTING_LAYOUT="vertical"
POSTING_HEADING__VISIBLE="false"

# Command to run
posting --env dev.env

You can transform the currently open request into a cURL command and copy it to your clipboard.

Steps:

1. Open the command palette.
2. Select export: copy as curl.

You can append custom arguments to the generated cURL command by setting curl_export_extra_args in your config.yaml.

# config.yaml
# These args are inserted immediately after 'curl '
curl_export_extra_args: "--verbose -w %{time_total} %{http_code}"

Resulting command example:

curl --verbose -w %{time_total} %{http_code} -X POST ...

If you prefer using pipx over uv, you can install Posting using the following command:

pipx install posting