monetlisa

Terminal image generation powered by OpenAI subscription auth.

monetlisa is a small Go CLI derived from blitz. It uses the same OpenAI/Codex subscription login flow, but sends prompts to the Responses API with the image_generation tool enabled and writes the generated image to disk.

Auth

Use your OpenAI/Codex subscription login:

monetlisa login

Open the printed URL, enter the code, and monetlisa saves OAuth tokens to:

~/.monetlisa/auth.json

It also falls back to an existing Codex CLI login at:

~/.codex/auth.json

Usage

monetlisa "A tiny oil painting of a corgi astronaut on the moon"
monetlisa -o cover.webp "Editorial cover art: a calm robot gardener"
monetlisa --size 1024x1536 --quality high --format webp "Tall art nouveau poster of a fox magician"
monetlisa --image screenshot.png --action edit -o mockup.webp "Modernize this UI while preserving layout"
cat prompt.txt | monetlisa --output images/generated.webp
monetlisa status

The command prints the saved image path. Relative output paths resolve from the directory where you call monetlisa, not from ~/.monetlisa.

Image input and edits

Pass one or more reference images with --image / -i. Local files are encoded as input_image data URLs; HTTP(S) image URLs and data:image/... URLs are passed through. Supported local file types are PNG, JPEG, WEBP, and GIF.

monetlisa --image screenshot.png --action edit -o mockup.webp \
  "Modernize this dashboard while preserving the information architecture"
monetlisa -i before.png,logo.png --image-detail high -o redesign.webp \
  "Create a cleaner SaaS UI using these references"

Use --action edit to force image editing/reference behavior. The default --action auto lets the model decide whether to generate or edit based on the prompt and attached images.

Output paths

If -o / --output is omitted, monetlisa uses your configured default-output-path when set:

monetlisa config set default-output-path images/latest.webp

If neither is set, it writes a timestamped file in the current directory:

monetlisa-YYYYMMDD-HHMMSS.webp

Defaults and config

Defaults:

• model: gpt-5.5
• image tool size: auto
• quality: auto
• format: webp
• background: auto
• image generation action: auto
• input image detail: high
• fast mode: enabled (service_tier: priority)
• timeout: 10m

Configure persistent defaults in ~/.monetlisa/config.json:

monetlisa config set model gpt-5.5
monetlisa config set default-output-path images/latest.webp
monetlisa config set size 1024x1024
monetlisa config set quality high
monetlisa config set format webp
monetlisa config set background auto
monetlisa config unset default-output-path

Supported config keys include: model, codex-home, skills-dir, prompt, default-output-path, size, quality, format, background, reasoning, max-output-tokens, timeout, and fast.

Supported combinations

A parallel sweep of all exposed combinations found that background=auto and background=opaque work across the supported sizes, qualities, and formats. background=transparent is rejected by the current subscription image model (Transparent background is not supported for this model), so the CLI now rejects it before making the request.

In that sweep, webp produced substantially smaller files than png while retaining good quality, so the default output format is webp.

Flags

-model             model name, default gpt-5.5
-o, -output        output image path; relative paths resolve from current directory
-default-output-path fallback output image path when -output is omitted
-size              auto, 1024x1024, 1024x1536, 1536x1024
-quality           auto, low, medium, high
-format            webp, png, jpeg
-background        auto, opaque
-action            auto, generate, edit
-image-detail      auto, low, high, original
-i, -image         input image path, URL, or data URL (repeatable, comma-separated)
-prompt            optional system prompt
-skills-dir        directory of skill markdown prompts
-fast              request Fast mode via service_tier=priority; default true
-timeout           request timeout, default 10m
-codex-home        Codex home containing auth.json
-monetlisa-home    Monetlisa home containing auth.json and config.json

Environment variables:

MONETLISA_MODEL
MONETLISA_PROMPT
MONETLISA_DEFAULT_OUTPUT_PATH
MONETLISA_SIZE
MONETLISA_QUALITY
MONETLISA_FORMAT
MONETLISA_BACKGROUND
MONETLISA_SKILLS_DIR
MONETLISA_REASONING_EFFORT
MONETLISA_HOME
CODEX_HOME

Build

mise x go@1.26.4 -- go test ./...
mise x go@1.26.4 -- go build -o monetlisa ./cmd/monetlisa

If Go is installed normally:

go test ./...
go build -o monetlisa ./cmd/monetlisa

License

MIT