AI Command Line Tools Part 2

In this week’s Data Diaries, let’s dig into the actual AI command line tools themselves. Last week, we covered the necessary installation systems to make them work, such as Homebrew and Chocolatey; be sure to review part 1 so you’re setup.

Now that we’re ready, let’s start looking at some of the power tools I use.

1. ffmpeg. ffmpeg is a media converter that can convert just about anything to anything – turn a video into an MP3, change the format of a video from h.264 to h.265 (a much more efficient format), resize a video from HD to SD. If you do any kind of work with video, it’s absolutely essential, and tools like Claude Code can run it for you and write the appropriate commands. You’d use a prompt like this, once you’ve installed it by Homebrew or Chocolatey:

Using ffmpeg in the terminal, help me convert this video from standard MP4 to HEVC format, and upscale it to 4K using ffmpeg. {video location on your computer} Our priorities are visual, video quality, and file size in equal balance. We want small files that are great looking. ffmpeg is installed and you must use it.

2. pandoc. pandoc converts most documents to most other documents, especially things like Markdown, most Microsoft office documents, ePub for ebooks, etc. Got a Word document you want to convert to an eBook for Amazon Kindle? Pandoc can do that. Got a mysterious file? Ask Pandoc to see if it can convert it. The only file type Pandoc has a hard time with is PDF. Here’s an example prompt you’d use with something like Claude Code:

Using pandoc in the Terminal, help me convert this Word document into an ebook in EPUB format for Amazon Kindle. Along with the image file, build the necessary front matter and metadata, and create the final e-book in EPUB format in the same folder. DOCX: {Word file name} Cover Image: {image file name} pandoc is installed and you must use it.

3. yt-dlp. Got a YouTube video that you want to download for posterity? yt-dlp will let you do that. Want to download an entire playlist? What about just the audio of videos? How about just the captions? yt-dlp does all that. It’s one of my favorite ways to grab a lot of data all at once; closed captions files in particular can be a rich source of useful information. Download a big batch and put them in NotebookLM to have as a personal reference encyclopedia. Here’s an example prompt:

Using yt-dlp in the terminal, help me download the English language subtitles for every video on this YouTube playlist. Store the subtitles in a subfolder named {folder name}. After the subtitles are downloaded, rename all the file extensions to .txt files. yt-dlp is installed and you must use it.

These three command line tools work with many of the media files that we marketers and business folks want to work with often. Video, office documents, audio, et cetera. By providing command line tools to our Claude code or similar agentic AI systems, we can dramatically reduce the token usage and get consistent, reliable results by having AI be the operator of the software rather than trying to write its own.

In the next issue, 3 information tools that are essential for maxing out what AI tools can do for you. Stay tuned!

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