Installation

Vault requires .NET 9.0 or later to be installed on your system.

Prerequisites

Before installing Vault, ensure you have .NET 9.0 or later installed:

dotnet --version

If you need to install .NET, visit the official .NET download page.

Installation Methods

Global Tool (Recommended)
From Source

The easiest way to install Vault is as a .NET global tool. This makes the vault command available system-wide.

Install the tool

Run the following command to install Vault globally:

dotnet tool install --global Vault.10.25.25

This will download and install the latest version of Vault from the NuGet package repository.

Verify installation

Confirm that Vault is installed correctly by checking the version:

vault list

If this is your first time running Vault, you should see:

(no keys)

This confirms that Vault is working and has created your personal database.

Check database location

Your vault database has been created at:

C:\Users\{username}\.kvstore\store.db

The database directory (.kvstore) is automatically created in your home directory.

If you want to build Vault from source or contribute to development, you can clone and build the project.

Clone the repository

Clone the Vault repository to your local machine:

git clone https://github.com/tobibytes/Vault.git
cd Vault

Build the project

Build the project using the .NET CLI:

dotnet build

This will restore dependencies and compile the project.

Run from source

You can run Vault directly from source using:

dotnet run -- <command> <args>

For example:

dotnet run -- add mykey "my value"
dotnet run -- list

The -- separator is required to pass arguments to the application rather than to the dotnet run command.

Optional: Install locally as a tool

To install your built version as a global tool:

dotnet pack
dotnet tool install --global --add-source ./bin/Debug Vault.10.25.25

Updating Vault

To update Vault to the latest version:

dotnet tool update --global Vault.10.25.25

Uninstalling Vault

If you need to uninstall Vault:

dotnet tool uninstall --global Vault.10.25.25

Uninstalling the tool does not delete your vault database. Your data will remain in the .kvstore directory in your home folder. To completely remove all data, manually delete the .kvstore directory after uninstalling.

Troubleshooting

Command not found after installation

If the vault command is not recognized after installation, you may need to add the .NET tools directory to your PATH:

$env:PATH += ";$env:USERPROFILE\.dotnet\tools"

To make this permanent, add the export command to your shell profile (~/.bashrc, ~/.zshrc, etc.).

Permission errors on Linux/macOS

If you encounter permission errors when creating the database, ensure your home directory has proper write permissions:

ls -ld ~

.NET version mismatch

Vault requires .NET 9.0. If you have an older version installed, you’ll see an error during installation. Update to .NET 9.0 or later:

dotnet --version

Visit dotnet.microsoft.com to download the latest version.

Next Steps

Now that Vault is installed, learn how to use it:

Quickstart Guide

Get started with Vault in just a few minutes

Get Started

Commands

Configuration

Installation

Prerequisites

Installation Methods

Updating Vault

Uninstalling Vault

Troubleshooting

Command not found after installation

Permission errors on Linux/macOS

.NET version mismatch

Next Steps

Quickstart Guide

Build docs developers (and LLMs) love

Get Started

Commands

Configuration

​Prerequisites

​Installation Methods

​Updating Vault

​Uninstalling Vault

​Troubleshooting

​Command not found after installation

​Permission errors on Linux/macOS

​.NET version mismatch

​Next Steps

Quickstart Guide

Build docs developers (and LLMs) love

Prerequisites

Installation Methods

Updating Vault

Uninstalling Vault

Troubleshooting

Command not found after installation

Permission errors on Linux/macOS

.NET version mismatch

Next Steps