One database for agents
and humans, doing more with less RAM less disk less setup less ops less latency less code less RAM

One line installs the prebuilt less binary (macOS arm64, Linux x64).

$ curl -fsSL https://lessdb.dev/install.sh | sh

# The installer fetches the release for your OS/arch from the
# Cloudflare package host and puts `less` on your PATH.
$ less --version                            # lessdb 0.1.0

# Prefer building from source? (Rust ≥ 1.85)
$ cargo install --path crates/less-cli --features cloud,gpu

The installer only writes to ~/.lessdb plus one PATH line — delete both to uninstall.

$ less init        # creates .less/ here — or --dir /data/mydb

$ less create "CREATE TABLE events (
    id Int64, kind String, amount Float64, ts DateTime
) ENGINE = MergeTree ORDER BY (kind, id) UNIQUE (kind) COMPRESSION = 'zstd'"

# CSV headers map to columns (any order); empty/`\N` cells are NULL:
$ less insert events --csv events.csv          # or --jsonl / --parquet / --arrow
$ less sql "INSERT INTO events VALUES (2, 'view', 1.5, '2025-01-01 10:01:00')"
$ less sql "COPY (SELECT * FROM events) TO 'export.parquet'"

$ less sql "SELECT kind, count(*) AS c, sum(amount) AS total
          FROM events GROUP BY kind ORDER BY total DESC"

$ less sql "SELECT * FROM events WHERE kind = 'click' AND ts > '2025-01-01'"

$ less sql                                      # interactive REPL (end with ;)
$ less sql "EXPLAIN SELECT ..."                 # plan + part-pruning info

Full SQL surface: joins, CTEs, window functions, subqueries. UNIQUE columns dedup keep-last at flush/merge; run less optimize events to enforce across parts. less describe events / less parts events show storage state.

$ less vector create docs 3 --metric cosine                    # flat exact
$ less vector create big 256 --index ivf_pq --nlist 64 --m 8   # ANN
$ less vector add docs --vectors '[[1,0,0],[0,1,0],[0.9,0.1,0]]' \
                    --payloads '[{"title":"rust"},{"title":"python"},{"title":"rust-like"}]'
$ less vector search docs '[1,0,0]' --k 2
$ less vector embed "rust database"        # built-in trigram embedder (demo)

# SQL, too — and you can join/filter the hits:
$ less sql "SELECT id, payload FROM vector_search('docs', [1.0,0.0,0.0], 10)
          WHERE payload LIKE '%rust%'"

Link notes, tasks, and projects in the same data dir — no extra services.

$ less context put proj/lessdb "LessDB" "Analytical DB in Rust" --tag db --kind project
$ less context put task/123 "GPU kernels" "wgpu filtered-sum + dot" --tag gpu --kind task
$ less context link task/123 proj/lessdb depends_on
$ less context find gpu
$ less context neighbors task/123 && less context path task/123 proj/lessdb

$ less memory create people --field id:Int64 --field name:Utf8 --pk id
$ less memory insert people '[{"id":1,"name":"ada"},{"id":2,"name":"grace"}]'
$ less memory sql "SELECT count(*) FROM people"

Everything persists under .less/memory/.

One stdio connection exposes 27 tools to any MCP client — no plugins, no sync jobs.

$ less mcp            # stdio JSON-RPC, uses --dir .less by default

# Lock the door and hold agents accountable:
$ less token create claude --role read --tenant default   # prints the token once
$ less mcp --require-auth      # tokens required, roles enforced, fail-closed
$ less audit --since 24h       # every call, both doors, newest first

Claude Code:

$ claude mcp add lessdb -- less mcp --dir /abs/path/to/mydb

Claude Desktop claude_desktop_config.json:

{ "mcpServers": { "lessdb": { "command": "less", "args": ["mcp", "--dir", "/abs/path/to/mydb"] } } }

Agents get 27 tools: less_query/explain/schema/stats/tables/optimize, context_*, memory_*, vector_*.

$ less server --addr 127.0.0.1:7080
$ curl -s localhost:7080/health
$ curl -s localhost:7080/v1/sql -H 'content-type: application/json' \
     -d '{"sql":"SELECT count(*) FROM events"}'          # JSON
$ curl -s localhost:7080/metrics                           # Prometheus text

# LDAP/AD auth (fail-closed group→role mapping):
$ less init --auth @auth.json   # see docs/ARCHITECTURE.md §9 for the schema
$ curl -u alice:secret -H 'content-type: application/json' \
     -d '{"sql":"SELECT 1"}' localhost:7080/v1/sql

Prometheus:

scrape_configs:
  - job_name: lessdb
    static_configs: [{ targets: ["localhost:7080"] }]

$ less init --shared s3://my-bucket/lessdb        # parts + catalog in S3

Any node with the same --shared URL sees the same tables instantly; local disk stays ephemeral (buffers/caches only). file:// for local dev.

# # npm — the CLI as a package (postinstall fetches + verifies the binary):
$ npm install -g lessdb
$ lessdb sql "SELECT 40 + 2"
$ npx lessdb --version        # one-shot, nothing installed

# Homebrew — same binary from the same host:
$ brew tap maruthiprithivi/lessdb
$ brew install lessdb

$ less bench --rows 5000000     # insert + scan/filter/group-by throughput
$ less gpu                      # GPU vs CPU kernels (Metal/Vulkan)
$ less metrics                  # this process's Prometheus metrics

More: README.md, docs/ARCHITECTURE.md, docs/ROADMAP.md, and the agent skills in skills/.