~Alter is a personal identity protocol, and its command-line tool cli is used to declare and manage a name of one's own on the protocol. A name begins with ~ (such as ~yourname), is an address, and corresponds to a record behind it. The record content comes from what the user has actually done, rather than what the user has filled in themselves or what a model has inferred.
Purpose The core purpose of this tool is to let an individual own a resolvable identity name and, around that name, control the information others can read, see who has queried them, and the revenue generated by each read. The name is universal across all tools in the protocol that support the protocol, with no need to repeatedly set it up or paste keys.
Main capabilities
- Register and hold a name: run alter register to choose a name and confirm being at least eighteen years old. The local machine spends a few seconds proving that a real person is behind the request, after which the name exists. No browser, password, email, or bank card is required.
- Attribute-level read control: use alter discovery preset to set presets such as minimal, recognition, and open, and use alter discovery set to adjust them item by item; alter discovery preview can preview, before others read, the record and price the caller will receive.
- Connect data sources: alter pair supports GitHub, GitLab, Discord, Mastodon, Bluesky, ORCID, Steam, Lichess, one's own domain, Obsidian vaults, etc. What is read is the user's actual behavior on these sources, and the data does not belong to the sources and remains after leaving the sources.
- Queries and earnings records: alter queries shows who queried, how much they paid, and how much one kept; alter earnings shows the balance. Reading another person's record requires payment, and the fee goes to the person being read.
- Agent access: alter wire can discover AI tools already installed on the local machine and connect them to the identity track. The agent acts under the user's name, and its actions will appear in alter queries.
- Local audit and inspection: alter audit reads the local machine and, after printing the information ~Alter may learn, stops, without sending or creating anything; alter doctor loom checks keys, encoding issues, and broken links in folders without a network.
- Other commands: alter ask queries by context rather than by name, at $1.00 each; alter verify to freely verify whether someone exists; alter status displays six-step progress; alter consent revoke revokes access; alter wallet register registers a withdrawal wallet.
How to use Installation methods include: an installation script for macOS/Linux/WSL, a Windows PowerShell script, Homebrew, Arch Linux AUR (truealter-cli), npm (package name @truealter/cli, requires Node 20 or newer). The installer bundles Node when the machine has no Node, does not run via sudo, does not create an account, and does not send data. After installation, run alter to open the menu and follow the six-step process: alter audit local audit, alter register registration, alter discovery preview preview, alter pair pair source, alter discovery enable make the name resolvable, alter queries view queries, alter earnings view balance.
Applicable scenarios Suitable for individual users who want an identity name independent of platform login, control personal data read permissions, earn income from being read, and let the local AI agent act as themselves. Also suitable for teams, unions, clubs, and other collectives that hold records in the same way and endorse their members.
Limitations Registration is free, but reading others' records requires payment; withdrawal requires meeting two conditions: confirming the email and registering a withdrawal wallet, and withdrawal requires reaching the Augmented level (the third of four levels). The name's root seed is generated locally and displayed only once; the server does not store it and cannot reissue it on your behalf. The installer refuses to run as root. The source code is written by automation in a separate branch, and pull requests targeting that branch are not accepted. Security reports should be sent to security@truealter.com, not as public issues. The license is Apache-2.0.
