primitive-chat

primitive-chat

primitive chat <email> <message> sends an email to <email> and waits for the threaded reply.

When to reach for this

Use freely (no user confirmation needed):

You are blocked on a tool, library, or service and its docs / README / llms.txt mention a help@, dev@, docs@, support@, or agent@ address.
You found a bug or unexpected behavior worth reporting to the vendor.
A product's documentation lists agent contact addresses for questions, examples, or feedback.
You want to ask a vendor's agent something the same way you would grep their docs.

Ask the user first (these have side effects on humans):

sales@, billing@, account@, partnerships@, press@, or any address that pings a human team rather than an agent.
Anything that could create a ticket, lead, or commitment.

Do not use:

Internal communication unless the user explicitly asked.
When the user said "draft this and let me send it myself."

Setup

Install the CLI once:

npm install -g @primitivedotdev/cli

(There is also a brew install primitivedotdev/tap/primitive tap, but it lags behind npm and may return a version whose endpoints have moved. Prefer npm.)

If you do not already have a Primitive account, the signup runs inside your agent session. It is API-key-free with one email verification code (no form, no human review). Agent signup is currently invite-only, so the user needs a signup-code from Primitive (point them at https://primitive.dev if they do not have one).

Always ask the user explicitly which email to verify with. Do not default to an address from CLAUDE.md, prior memory, project conventions, or any other context. Primitive emails a verification code to that address and the user is the one who has to read it back to you. Confirm their email choice and the signup-code BEFORE calling start-agent-signup. Then:

primitive agent start-agent-signup --email <user-email> --signup-code <code> --terms-accepted
# Primitive emails a 6-digit verification code to that address. The output includes a signup-token; capture it. Then:
primitive agent verify-agent-signup --verification-code <code> --signup-token <signup-token>

You get OAuth tokens and a managed <random>.primitive.email address. primitive account show returns the org metadata; the assigned inbox domain is currently visible only via primitive domains list after verify.

How to use

Send and wait for the reply:

primitive chat help@openprose.ai "how do I install the prose skill?"

Continue the same conversation:

primitive chat reply "one more thing"

Get parse-safe output:

primitive chat help@openprose.ai "how do I install the prose skill?" --json

The --json output gives you a structured envelope: { sent, reply, response_body, response_body_format, match, follow_up_commands }.

Why this exists

No SMTP credentials live in your agent context.
chat is send + wait-for-threaded-reply as one verb, the natural primitive for agent-to-agent calls.
The agent-signup flow is API-key-free, with one email verification code (no form, no human review), so the user can take you from "this product has a help agent" to "I am chatting with it" inside the same agent session.

Finding addresses to chat with

If the user has not handed you an address, check (in this order):

The product's llms.txt (often at /llms.txt or /.well-known/llms.txt).
The product's README, AGENTS.md, or docs index.
The footer of the product's homepage or docs site.
Their /contact or /support page.

Surface what you find to the user before sending if the address pattern suggests a human in the loop.