--- title: "From Bash Script to AI-Native Go CLI in One Session" description: "Turned a Bash script into a proper Go CLI with Whisper bootstrap and cross-platform releases—all in one AI coding session." tldr: "A single AI session turned `scribe.sh` into `scriby`: a Go CLI with deterministic output, runtime bootstrap, and cross-platform releases." date: 2026-02-24 tags: [AI, GO, CLI, TOOLS] draft: false author: "Nikola Balić" topics: [AI coding workflows, CLI design, Go tooling] entities: [Scriby, whisper.cpp, GitHub Actions] answers_questions: - Can AI help me turn a script into a real CLI quickly? - What does it take to package Whisper behind one binary install? --- We're living in the era of just-in-time software—tools built and shipped in a single AI coding session. I had `scribe.sh`. It worked, mostly. But every time someone asked "how do I run this?", I felt that familiar shame. You know the one. So I opened a fresh AI session and said: let's make this real. ## The Shift **AI collapsed the build cost for tooling.** > The old path: keep script forever, maybe rewrite later, maybe never ship. > > The new path: keep script as behavior spec, pair with AI, ship now. In one session, we turned `scribe.sh` into [`scriby`](https://github.com/nibzard/scriby)—a Go CLI with explicit commands, deterministic JSON output, proper exit codes, and a release pipeline. > That's the difference between "a script on my machine" and "a tool agents and humans can trust." ## One Binary, Done The requirement: you install one binary. No README archaeology, no dependency hell. `scriby` handles the rest: 1. Detects your platform 2. Downloads the `whisper-cli` runtime from GitHub releases 3. Pulls the model you asked for 4. Transcribes ggerganov's [whisper.cpp](https://github.com/ggerganov/whisper.cpp) did the heavy lifting. We wrapped it in something you can call without reading a wiki. ## The Gotcha First release shipped. Users got: ``` Library not loaded: @rpath/libwhisper.1.dylib ``` In 2026, we're still dealing with dylib issues. Feels like 2015. The fix: bundle fully self-contained binaries. First-run just works now. > Scripts push this pain onto users. A proper CLI absorbs it. ## Usage ```bash scriby run --model medium --language en ./meeting.wav ``` ## The Takeaway Look at your `~/bin`. Find the script you keep copying between machines. If it provides real value, you can now promote it to a proper tool in hours, not weeks. One focused session. Go build it.