mvanhorn/printing-press-libraryApache-2.01 file

Pp Craigslist

The local-first Craigslist watcher and triage tool that knows what's a repost, what's a scam, and what just dropped in price. Trigger phrases: `watch craigslist for`, `find new listings on craigslist`, `craigslist deal alert`, `scan craigslist across cities`, `craigslist repost`, `craigslist scam check`, `use craigslist-pp-cli`, `run craigslist-pp`.

Specification
Skill ID
mvanhorn/printing-press-library/pp-craigslist
Publisher
mvanhorn
Repository
printing-press-library
Installs
0
Files
1
License
Apache-2.0
Synced
Sep 23, 2026
How to use it

Open any RiverX project, open the Skills panel in the chat, and search for this identifier. The files are fetched from the source repository at install time.

mvanhorn/printing-press-library/pp-craigslistInstalls these files
  • SKILL.md

What this skill tells the agent

<!-- GENERATED FILE — DO NOT EDIT. This file is a verbatim mirror of library/commerce/craigslist/SKILL.md, regenerated post-merge by tools/generate-skills/. Hand-edits here are silently overwritten on the next regen. Edit the library/ source instead. See the repository agent guide, section "Generated artifacts: registry.json, cli-skills/". -->

Craigslist — Printing Press CLI

Prerequisites: Install the CLI

This skill drives the craigslist-pp-cli binary. You must verify the CLI is installed before invoking any command from this skill. If it is missing, install it first:

  1. Install via the Printing Press installer. It defaults binaries to $HOME/.local/bin on macOS/Linux and %LOCALAPPDATA%\Programs\PrintingPress\bin on Windows: ``bash npx -y @mvanhorn/printing-press-library install craigslist --cli-only ``
  2. Verify: craigslist-pp-cli --version
  3. Ensure the reported install directory is on $PATH for the agent/runtime that will invoke this skill.

If the npx install fails (no Node, offline, etc.), fall back to a direct Go install (requires Go 1.26.6 or newer):

go install github.com/mvanhorn/printing-press-library/library/commerce/craigslist/cmd/craigslist-pp-cli@latest

If --version reports "command not found" after install, the runtime cannot see the binary directory on $PATH. Do not proceed with skill commands until verification succeeds.

When to Use This CLI

Use craigslist-pp-cli when you need scriptable, local-first access to Craigslist listings — searching with filters Craigslist's own UI doesn't support (NOT-keyword), watching saved searches across multiple cities and getting alerted only on true new listings, doing price-drift or repost detection on housing, and triaging suspect rentals against cross-city duplicate signals. Best for read-heavy workflows: watching, exporting, comparing, scoring. Posting and account management are out of scope.

When Not to Use This CLI

Do not activate this CLI for requests that require creating, updating, deleting, publishing, commenting, upvoting, inviting, ordering, sending messages, booking, purchasing, or changing remote state. This printed CLI exposes read-only commands for inspection, export, sync, and analysis.

Unique Capabilities

These capabilities aren't available in any other tool for this API.

Compounding watch surface

  • `watch run` — Periodic poll for a saved search that emits NEW, PRICE-DROP, and SEED events instead of any-listing-I-haven't-seen — so true new listings stand out from edits and reposts. Cross-city repost detection lives in the separate reposts command; cross-city dup detection lives in dupe-cluster.

_Pick this over a generic search call when an agent is alerting a user — only true-new listings are worth pinging on, and the typed diff event tells the agent how to phrase the alert._

  craigslist-pp-cli watch save apartments --query 1BR --negate furnished,sublet --sites sfbay --category apa --max-price 2500 && craigslist-pp-cli watch run apartments --seed-only && craigslist-pp-cli watch run apartments --json
  • `watch tail` — Long-running tail that prints one JSON event per new diff result so an agent or shell pipeline can react in real time. Emits NEW and PRICE-DROP events.

_When you want a continuous stream of new-listing events to pipe into a Slack/email sender, jq filter, or downstream agent loop._

  craigslist-pp-cli watch tail apartments --interval 5m --json

Local snapshot history

  • `drift` — Show the price timeline for a single listing across every snapshot we've captured.

_Agents negotiating on behalf of a buyer can quote concrete price-drop history — "this listing was $50, now $35, posted 14 days ago."_

  craigslist-pp-cli drift 7915891289 --json
  • `dupe-cluster` — Find listings whose body fingerprint and image hash match across cities. Surfaces cross-city scams and aggregator reposts.

_Use before driving across town to view a rental — a cluster of 6+ cities for one apartment is almost always a scam._

  craigslist-pp-cli dupe-cluster --category apa --min-cluster-size 3 --json
  • `reposts` — Find listings that have been reposted N or more times in the last X days, by body fingerprint clustering.

_Reposts signal motivated sellers (negotiation leverage) or spam flooders (skip). Telling them apart is the value._

  craigslist-pp-cli reposts 'eames lounge' --min-reposts 3 --window 30d --json
  • `cities heat` — Across cities, count fresh listings per category over a window. Surfaces which markets are hot for what.

_When an agent is hunting cross-city for a specific item, knowing which 3 cities have the most fresh activity tells it where to look first._

  craigslist-pp-cli cities heat --category sss --since 24h --top 20 --json

Triage and scoring

  • `scam-score` — Rule-based 0-100 score for a listing using brand-new-account, below-median-price, wire-transfer keywords, and cross-city duplicate signals.

_Agents triaging "is this listing legit" questions get an actionable number plus the per-rule contributions, instead of a vibes-based answer._

  craigslist-pp-cli scam-score 7915891289 --json
  • `median` — p25/p50/p75 of prices for a query, optionally over a time window or split by city.

_When an agent needs a fair-price benchmark before suggesting an offer, or when a reseller is sizing up a market._

  craigslist-pp-cli median 'iphone 15' --category mob --since 30d --by-city --json

Search beyond CL

  • `search --negate` — Search with NOT-keyword filtering that Craigslist's own search doesn't support natively.

_Apartment-hunting and job-search personas live and die by exclusion terms; this is the difference between scanning 50 results and scanning 5._

  craigslist-pp-cli search '1BR' --category apa --site sfbay --negate furnished,sublet,studio --json
  • `since` — Ad-hoc "what's new in this category in this city since X duration ago" without setting up a saved search.

_The first command an agent should run for "what hit while I was sleeping" — no per-watch setup, no state, just a window._

  craigslist-pp-cli since 24h --site sfbay --category sss --query ipad --json

Command Reference

The full command tree is discoverable via craigslist-pp-cli --help and recursively via craigslist-pp-cli <command> --help. Headline groups:

  • Reference taxonomy: categories list, areas list, catalog refresh
  • Search & fetch: search, postings, listing get|get-by-pid|images, filters show
  • Local store population: cl-sync
  • Saved-search watches: watch save|list|show|delete|run|tail
  • Snapshot analytics: drift, dupe-cluster, reposts, median, cities heat, since, geo within|bbox
  • Triage: scam-score
  • Local-state CRUD: favorite add|list|remove
  • Framework helpers: doctor, version, which, agent-context, analytics, export, import, feedback, profile, tail, sync, workflow

Freshness Contract

This printed CLI owns bounded freshness only for registered store-backed read command paths. In --data-source auto mode, those paths check sync_state and may run a bounded refresh before reading local data. --data-source local never refreshes. --data-source live reads the API and does not mutate the local store. Set CRAIGSLIST_NO_AUTO_REFRESH=1 to skip the freshness hook without changing source selection.

Covered paths:

  • craigslist-pp-cli postings

When JSON output uses the generated provenance envelope, freshness metadata appears at meta.freshness. Treat it as current-cache freshness for the covered command path, not a guarantee of complete historical backfill or API-specific enrichment.

Finding the right command

Use this skill in a project

Open any RiverX project, search the Skills panel for mvanhorn/printing-press-library/pp-craigslist, and install it in one click.

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