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+# SPDK CLI {#spdkcli}
+
+Spdkcli is a command-line management application for SPDK.
+Spdkcli has support for a limited number of applications and bdev modules,
+and should be considered experimental for the v18.04 release.
+This experimental version was added for v18.04 to get early feedback
+that can be incorporated as spdkcli becomes more fully-featured
+for the next SPDK release.
+
+### Install needed dependencies
+
+All dependencies should be handled by scripts/pkgdep.sh script.
+Package dependencies at the moment include:
+
+ - configshell
+
+### Run SPDK application instance
+
+~~~{.sh}
+./scripts/setup.sh
+./build/bin/vhost -c vhost.conf
+~~~
+
+### Run SPDK CLI
+
+Spdkcli should be run with the same privileges as SPDK application.
+In order to use SPDK CLI in interactive mode please use:
+~~~{.sh}
+scripts/spdkcli.py
+~~~
+Use "help" command to get a list of available commands for each tree node.
+
+It is also possible to use SPDK CLI to run just a single command,
+just use the command as an argument to the application.
+For example, to view current configuration and immediately exit:
+ ~~~{.sh}
+scripts/spdkcli.py ls
+~~~
+
+### Optional - create Python virtual environment
+
+You can use Python virtual environment if you don't want to litter your
+system Python installation.
+
+First create the virtual environment:
+~~~{.sh}
+cd spdk
+mkdir venv
+virtualenv-3 ./venv
+source ./venv/bin/activate
+~~~
+
+Then install the dependencies using pip. That way dependencies will be
+installed only inside the virtual environment.
+~~~{.sh}
+(venv) pip install configshell-fb
+~~~
+
+Tip: if you are using "sudo" instead of root account, it is suggested to do
+"sudo -s" before activating the environment. This is because venv might not work
+correctly when calling spdkcli with sudo, like "sudo python spdkcli.py" -
+some environment variables might not be passed and you will experience errors.