Curlman

A fast, minimal desktop app for running raw cURL commands.
Paste cURL. Press Enter. Get the response.

Why Curlman

API docs, browser DevTools and teammates all hand you requests as cURL. Most API clients make you take those commands apart into URL fields, header tables and body tabs. Curlman doesn't. It reads the command the way a shell does and runs it with the real curl binary, so every flag behaves exactly as it does in your terminal.

• Raw cURL first. No forms to fill in. Paste a command, or type a bare URL.
• Shell-accurate parsing. Handles bash/zsh quoting, \ line continuations, $'...' strings, and Windows cmd syntax with ^ escapes. Both of the browser's "Copy as cURL" formats work as-is.
• A real editor. Syntax highlighting, line numbers, active line, cursor position, and one-key formatting between one-line and multi-line.
• Autocomplete. Suggests curl flags, methods after -X, and header names and values after -H.
• Readable responses. Pretty JSON that keeps large numbers exact, HTML source and sandboxed preview, images, headers, and a timing breakdown (DNS, connect, TLS, time to first byte, download).
• History. Every request is saved locally, grouped by day and searchable.
• Small and quick. Built with Tauri and the system WebView: a 3 MB app, about 1 MB installer, around 25 MB of memory.

Install

Download the installer from the Releases page, or build it yourself (see Development).

Curlman uses the curl that's already on your system: %SystemRoot%\System32\curl.exe on Windows 10 and later, or curl on your PATH on macOS and Linux. To use a different binary, set the CURLMAN_CURL environment variable.

Usage

Paste a command and press Enter:

curl 'https://api.example.com/users' \
  -H 'Authorization: Bearer TOKEN' \
  -H 'Content-Type: application/json' \
  -d '{"name":"John"}'

Enter works like a shell. It sends the request, unless the text before the cursor ends in a line continuation (\ or ^) or an open quote. In that case it adds a new line.

Keyboard shortcuts

Key	Action
Enter	Send (or add a new line inside a quote or after \)
Ctrl/Cmd + Enter	Send from anywhere
Shift + Enter	New line
Esc	Cancel the running request
Ctrl + Space	Show suggestions
Tab / Enter / Up / Down	Accept or move through suggestions
Ctrl/Cmd + L	Focus and select the command
Ctrl/Cmd + Shift + F	Format: toggle multi-line and one-line
Ctrl/Cmd + B	Toggle history
Ctrl/Cmd + K	Search history
Ctrl/Cmd + N	New request
Ctrl/Cmd + 1 / 2 / 3	Body / Headers / Timing
Ctrl/Cmd + Shift + C	Copy the response

What Curlman changes in your command

Curlman captures output itself, so it removes flags that would redirect or reshape it: -o, -O, -i, -v, -s, -S, -w, -D, -f, --trace and similar. Every other flag is passed to curl unchanged.

Development

Requirements: Node.js 22+, Rust, and the Tauri prerequisites for your platform.

npm install
npm run tauri dev     # desktop app with hot reload
npm run dev           # the same UI in a browser at http://localhost:1420
npm run tauri build   # release app and installer

In browser mode the Vite dev server runs curl for the page, so requests work the same as in the desktop app. Opening dist/index.html on its own has no backend, and the app says so.

Release output:

• App: src-tauri/target/release/curlman.exe
• Installer: src-tauri/target/release/bundle/nsis/Curlman_<version>_x64-setup.exe

Tests

npm test            # parser, highlighters, autocomplete, browser-mode backend
npm run test:rust   # Rust backend: running curl, binary bodies, errors, cancellation
npm run test:e2e    # drives the real UI in the desktop app, browser mode,
                    # and the static bundle without a backend
npm run test:all    # everything, including a release build

Tests run against a local HTTP server and don't need internet access. The end-to-end tests need Chrome or Edge, or CURLMAN_E2E_BROWSER pointing at a Chromium-based browser. The desktop part runs on Windows and needs a release build.

Project layout

Path	Purpose
src/parse.ts	Shell tokenizer (bash and cmd), flag handling, formatter
src/suggest.ts	Context-aware autocomplete
src/highlight.ts	Editor, JSON and markup highlighting
src/bridge.ts	Calls the backend through Tauri IPC or the dev server
src/main.ts	The UI
src-tauri/src/main.rs	Desktop backend: runs curl, captures headers, body and timing
scripts/dev-bridge.ts	The same backend for npm run dev
scripts/*.test.ts	Backend and end-to-end tests